by Shaun Lawton
When the map becomes the territory, the world comes alive in a snap. The tumultuous terrain breaks free in upheaval, shedding series of dorsal fins from overlapping tectonic plates. Generated from the interstices in between, wriggling out a host of scuttling insects that swarm and shudder off into the shadowy distance. A bifurcating reality opens up, as if being unzipped and let in to ours; a monstrous invasion with no apparent way of stopping it.
These were to be known as the Dragons of the Instant, another manifestation of demonic possession. What makes them unnerving but not overtly dangerous is how, upon their manifestation before us, while taking on the appearance of an objectively autonomous creature capable of attacking, they always render as an optical illusion and instead phase into the backdrop scenery itself, unraveling into the foothills along the horizon, revealing itself to be another section of the land we're traversing. It does feel as if a map were being unfolded at our feet, a map to step into through which we enter into the terrain it depicts. Leaving behind the sensation mirrored in the unfolding of creatures capable of appearing any time.
