SOUTH PORTLAND (WGME) – Several employees from Build-A-Bear were inside the Maine Mall when shots rang out.

They say it was a chaotic scene, and they really didn’t know what to do.

“This is my second week working there,” Build-A-Bear employee Audrey Simpson said. “I was stuffing bears, about to tie them. I had a family of eight with me. And next thing you know, my boss is telling us to get out of the mall because there’s a shooting. Honestly, I had no idea what to do, because I was not trained in a situation like this. So we had no idea where to go or what to do.”

“So, I wound up running inside, and people were like running past me, trying to get out, and I ran into Build-A-Bear, and we had evacuated, and I ran out the back and met everyone back there,” Build-A-Bear employee Duncan Outerbridge said.

“I asked what was going on, and they said that shots were heard,” Build-A-Bear employee Hannah Card said. “They were talking, and they heard that someone in the food court had been shot.”

Some of the stores inside the Maine Mall have a back entrance, like Build-A-Bear.

The employees say that allowed them to escape the dangerous situation a lot sooner.