Not a dog

 One autumn evening, I was returning from my summer cottage to the city. My cottage is located about twenty kilometers from the city, so I had to drive a pretty decent distance. It was dark on the road, so I turned on the high beam. There were no cars on the road, so I accelerated. Maybe he was speeding a little...

When the pale dog jumped out right in front of the car, I didn't have time to slow down and hit it. I stopped the car on the road a little further. I couldn't move for a few seconds. I was shocked. For some reason, I was sure that it was a pet dog, and I would have to tell its owners, who were about to leave the forest surrounding the road, that I had hit their pet.

I got out of the car. There was a dent and scuff marks on the front passenger side. Although the dent was noticeable, I still expected the worst, hitting the dog at such a speed. Then I had a hope that things might not be so bad with the dog. I spotted her a little ahead on the road and headed towards her. The animal was twitching. The closer I got, the more it seemed to regain consciousness. At first, I assumed that it was trying to get up, but then I noticed that something was wrong. The creature's skin—now I saw that it wasn't a dog at all—was hairless, pale, almost gray, and translucent, tightly covering the bones. Besides, this creature was too big for a dog. I didn't see any blood. His limbs were disproportionate and very strange, resembling both canine and human — most of all, I remember the gnarled fingers with large distances between them. It stood up on its hind legs, in this position resembling not a dog, but a monkey as tall as me, and turned in my direction. When his big black eyes stared at me, I took a few hesitant steps back, then ran. Immediately, the creature rushed at me, and I'm sure that if I hadn't managed to escape from it, its jaws would have closed on my neck.

I had never run so fast before, but the creature was not far behind. Finally, I jumped into the car and slammed the door. Then the creature began to pace right in front of the car, at the very edge of the headlights. I started the car, and it violently rushed at the glass on the side. Thank God, the glass held up. I pushed the accelerator pedal to the floor and drove away, squeezing everything out of the car. Because of the darkness, I couldn't see if the creature was chasing me or had long since fallen behind, but I kept glancing nervously at the rearview mirror every minute until I reached the city.