Big Iron by Denis Vinnik

 It was a bitter cold morning in the village.

While everyone else enjoyed the comforts of their homes, only one man ventured outside, his heart as cold as the weather. He was strange-nobody even looked his way whenever they walked past him. His years of youth were long gone, and only hate sat in his careless soul.

I was sitting at my window scribbling something in my tattered notebook when, out of the corner of my eye, I saw an old crooked figure of a man stumbling slowly down the road covered in silvery white snow. I heard plenty of stories about him – that’s quite common when you live in a village. Still, I decided to follow him with my eyes. There was definitely something bizarre about him, but it wasn’t bad - just different from the others.

One of my flaws is curiosity, and at that moment it spiked through the roof. And so, I decided to see where he goes every night.

As I was following him, I began noticing more details about him. He was in his gray leather coat that he always wears, but there was something under it. Its shape was hard to make out, but I could tell that it was metal since it reflected from street lamps. Soon, he took a different path – the one that lead to the forest. It was getting dark, but still, I pushed on. As I traversed the green hushes of the forest, I saw him walking up to an old well. There, he leaned over and picked up an old cowboy hat and something else, it was too dark to tell what it was.

Suddenly, a stick snapped under my foot. Swiftly, his eyes found the source of the sound, and he raised that object, which turned out to be a gun. I was frozen in fear.

“Could be my last moments?” I thought to myself. At that moment, I cursed my curiosity, wishing that I had stayed at home instead. Suddenly, he shouted out, “Duck down!”. My mind was still petrified, but his strong command made my body obey his orders. Moments later, a psychopath took two shots, and then there was a loud thud sound beside me.

As I slowly turned my head, I saw this creature. It was no wolf or bear. It resembled something that couldn’t have come from this planet. After staring at the creature for a while, I felt a wrinkled hand on one of my shoulders.

-Beware what is beyond your comprehension, youngster. I have been guarding these forests for decades, and I can’t lose another soul to them. Every five years, this eldritch being wanders the forest, seeking humans to feast upon, and my fortune is to protect the world from it. Now go, and never follow this route into the forest again. I’m sorry you had to see this,” he said with no emotion whatsoever.

To this day, I have no idea what that creature was. Nobody in the village believed in such a wild story. Still, I must admit that if not for that man, I would have been long gone, just like the others.