Dying Wasn’t on the Itinerary

    As Sean stepped off the tour bus and onto the lush Irish grass, he looked back on his life. The only child of a middle-class, east-coast American family, he’d done what everyone said everyone else should do. He’d done well in school, spent four years at a reasonably affordable community college, and dutifully considered a post-graduate degree before settling on cutting his losses and entering the workforce instead.

    He’d landed a steady job for steady pay and steadily worked his way up the ladder to a supervisory position, where he had comfortably decided to stay until he eventually retired in forty years. Give or take ten years, of course, depending on when the government decided they’d finally allow him to collect his benefits.

    He shuffled forward, putting some distance between himself and the other tourists that were coming off behind him. For the first time since they’d left the hotel back in Dublin he lifted his head and scanned the horizon, and the view was like something off an old postcard.

    Framed by rolling emerald hills and hedgerows, he saw a set of raised earthen rings that the locals called a “fairy fort”. The oak and ash trees proudly topping each ring made it look like a crown against the slate grey sky and among the leaves was a flock of ravens, the big black birds cawing raucously to one another. On either side of the entrance sat a smaller mound of earth which, he recalled from the brochure, were burial mounds from some time back in the Stone Age. Beneath each of those picture-perfect mounds was a tomb, and within each tomb would be a much less picturesque corpse.

    The thought of what was in the mounds made his step hitch and he had to catch himself with his cane to keep from falling, the sudden strain drawing out a string of wet, hacking coughs. The bus had clearly emptied as harried families and giggling couples made their way past him without a care in the world. A screaming toddler fled from her frantic mother, nearly knocking him over in the process. Scowling, Sean pushed himself upright and continued on his way to the fort, nodding his head in respect to the mounds and their occupants as he passed.

    If things had gone like they were supposed to, he’d have been keeping up with the crowd right along with his girlfriend. He and Sara had met at work, the two of them sharing a cubicle wall. While Sean kept a pretty empty desk, he’d recognized some of the merch Sara kept on hers as being from one of his favorite PC games. That had led to a conversation, which in turn had led to a lunch, and before either of them knew it they’d gone from just hanging out and shooting the breeze to actively dating.

    It was an easy, casual relationship that had been beginning to turn more serious. Sean had always been curious about the Irish heritage on his mother’s side of the family, so Sara had suggested a long couple’s vacation to the Emerald Isle. They’d booked the trip earlier this year, a few weeks before Sean’s yearly physical, as both a getaway and a test to see if there was real long-term potential for the two of them. She’d politely withdrawn from it, as well as the rest of his life, a few weeks after.

    Sean winced as he made his way through the wall of trees and into the center of the fairy fort. He couldn’t blame her, even though he could feel his chest tightening at the memory of that last conversation. After all, what was the point in planning for a future with someone when that future was going to be measured in months? He knew Sara would be better off not seeing what was to come, she didn’t need that kind of pain in her life.

    Looking around himself, Sean could easily see why there were still superstitions around the old earth forts dotted around Ireland’s countryside. He’d been to a couple of the cities on this trip, but while they were certainly different from the ones back home they were still decidedly modern. The towns nestled between the country’s hills were less so, closer to what might have been the norm in Europe a hundred years prior. This place, though, there was something different here, something primeval.

    The spaces he occupied at home lacked that spark, as analyzed and dissected as the modern world was. Everything could be accounted for. Your upbringing and education dictate your lifestyle. Your lifestyle and genetics determine how long you’ll live and the quality of that life – except of course when you become the minority statistic who ends up with an aggressive lung cancer despite never touching a cigarette in your life. Of course that was still explainable, just unlucky. Like Sean, wonder and mystery were dying.

    The ring of trees that looked like a crown from a distance was, in the center of the ring, more like a solid wall of bark and branch. Sean could feel his breath quicken, coming short and shallow as he remembered the MRI machine surrounding him, its squawking alarms mirroring the harsh calls of the ravens in the boughs above. He tried to calm himself and focus on the moment, but for some reason his heart wouldn’t stop racing.

    Beginning to panic, Sean made his way over to the edge of the fort, leaning against the high earth berm forming the base of the wall. His heart began to beat even faster, his breath coming even harder as his vocal cords fought, and failed, to make words. His eyes scanned frantically up, and over the crowd, looking for someone who might have noticed his failing condition. No one seemed to care, even when the ravens crowding the copse alighted from their rest and began to circle above.

    As his legs gave out beneath him and his back slid down, rubbing a furrow in the grass, he realized this was probably the end. Giddily, he wondered whether they’d even notice he was missing from the tour bus, or if he’d be left for the next day’s patrons to find. His eyes dimming, he noticed the toddler from earlier staring wide eyed in his direction.

    Her eyes were fixed slightly above him, mouth agape. As everything faded towards black, Sean felt a sharp pressure bite into his shoulder like a set of talons. His head wouldn’t turn to see what it was, but he felt a cold breath on his ear before the darkness closed in completely.