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Cobb didn’t fear death.
He had long since made peace with the general idea of it and he knew that it was just the next step in the cycle of life. Hell, he’d had an Adirondack chair on Death’s front porch for centuries. It was where he felt most comfortable.
But he had always avoided it. Found a way out. Gone back for the people he loved.
The battle that would be his last didn’t scare him at the beginning.
It was a fairly straightforward thing, defending Kord’s plane from the invading war god. They’d done this sort of work for years.
But the situation got complicated. As it so often did.
Moonshine and Beverly were off to the west of Cobb and Hardwon, with intentions of coming to meet them soon. Their plan was to cut off Gruumsh from one side by taking the long way around, protecting Kord while their armies battled each other.
But then Hardwon was knocked out. By some cronies and before they had even made it to the rendezvous point.
Cobb dragged him into a hidden alcove, but saw his motion get clocked by the forces of Gruumsh who were close behind them.
This was it.
The thought surged across his mind without him realizing it. He had not intended to get to that point soon, let alone now.
But once he thought about it, he realized how true it was. How true it had to be.
Death did not scare him. He knew this. What he hadn’t anticipated, he thought as he stabilized his unconscious best friend, was how ready for it he would be.
He was 575 years old. He had lived more lives than he thought possible. He could try to live more of them, really. Try to find some way out of this. But he was so tired. And something, someone, in the ether had been calling to him, louder and louder as time passed. He missed the hell out of her. It was time to answer.
He heard a noise nearby and looked up. Quickly, he used his centuries of tracking and hunting knowledge to ensure that Hardwon’s body would not easily be found.
He quickly scanned the area, seeing that he had the smallest bit of time.
A moment to say goodbye.
Something in him hoped Hardwon would hear him, but he knew it wasn’t likely. But he had faith in the magic of the other man’s hammer and general existence, knowing that something would pass the words along. Eventually.
“Hey! Hey Hardwon! I don’t know if you can hear me.” Cobb began, shaking the half-elf in a last-ditch effort to get him to wake up, to not have this be the end. “Gruumsh’s guys saw me run up here. I’m - I’m gonna take ‘em a-as far as my old legs can run.”
He swallowed hard and took a breath before continuing. “But you - you gotta stay here, alright?”
Peace washed over him in that moment. He was ready. He just had to make sure Hardwon knew that.
“Now, don’t go blaming yourself. I know you’re gonna blame yourself. But…” He blinked as tears threatened to fill his eyes, and continued. “I ain’t doin’ you a favor, alright? You’re doin’ me one.”
The words poured out of him, and he knew as he said them how true they were. Even if he hadn’t considered it before they left his mouth. “Let this old man leave the world knowing that the kids are gonna be alright.”
They would be, they had to be. He knew that they would be. He could not dwell on how his death would hurt them. Otherwise, things would end up worse.
“Look after Moonshine and Bev for me, yeah?” He squeezed Hardwon’s hand and turned to walk away.
He only made it a few steps before realizing the weight and truth of how Hardwon would blame himself for this, and turned back. He looked over his shoulder and said, “Or better yet, you tell Moonshine and Bev to look after you, dumbass!”
He laughed at his own joke, choking on it slightly as he walked away. He hesitated one last time. He had to say one more thing, for Hardwon to hang onto. “Keep it light.”
He took off running. Once he felt he was a good distance away from Hardwon’s hiding place, he made a loud noise, knowing it would draw the attention of those looking for them both.
He knew he’d have a small amount of additional time, and pulled from his pocket a mushroom syringe.
Perfectly preserved. And centuries old.
His habit of carrying them around for the sake of Marabelle had not ever quite died. He and Moonshine had, eventually, worked out a formula with her mushrooms and the help of a Crick alchemist that would assist her wild shape. And he had taken to carrying around those concoctions for her.
This particular vial, however, was not of Moonshine’s mushrooms.
They were Marabelle’s.
Marabelle, like Moonshine, had possessed a type of rapport spores ability. It was more rudimentary, less direct, and they could never communicate using words with it. They had to rely on images, snippets of memories, and hope the person on the receiving end of the message would understand the hint. It did, however, have a larger range than Moonshine’s did.
Cobb knew those spores had never fully left his body. He would always be part of Marabelle’s network. It had always been something of a comfort to him, the ability to feel her nearby despite everything, the connection it gave him to Jolene.
As he moved the syringe toward him, he did everything he could to combine Moonshine’s spores with Marabelle’s. To take those networks, which had felt so separate to him for so long, and connect them to each other. To get the distance Marabelle’s spores had provided to connect him to Moonshine herself.
There was no way for him to know if it would work. If it had worked, once he’d done it. But he pictured the alcove where he had hidden Hardwon and the path he had followed to get there, and pushed it toward Moonshine.
He tried to attach the feeling of how much he loved her to the memory. So she’d never doubt that. He hated that he wouldn’t be able to truly say goodbye to her. That was his only regret, in choosing to die like this.
He felt confident in her ability to find the spot if she got the message. And he hoped something in the universe was on his side just enough to help him succeed.
With that business completed, he took another deep breath and observed his surroundings. He had found some sort of grove. He knew Isgard was connected to the Beastlands, and thought that perhaps this was a spot that eased the transition between the two planes, what with how beautiful it was. If he squinted, he could almost think he was at the Crick.
It was as good a place as any to die.
Cobb saw the members of Gruumsh’s forces coming around the corner just before they saw him. He used it to his advantage and fired quick shots with his blunderbuss. The lead scout fell before any of them knew they’d discovered their target.
He made quick work of one more as they closed on him, but he was quickly surrounded. It was easy enough for him to take stock of their numbers as they moved toward him and he realized, with some confidence and pride, that he had pulled all the people tracking them earlier away from Hardwon.
Despite the fact that he had been relatively uninjured in the scuffle that had knocked Hardwon out, he was no match for this many opponents. And he had always been built for fighting from a distance.
Ultimately, this had been his goal.
To fall here so his friends would not.
With the desperate but comforting knowledge that this was, truly, the end, he opened his mouth to speak his final words. The ones he had planned on being his final sentence for hundreds of years. “I’m on my way, Marabelle.”
He closed his eye as he took the axe hit he knew would be his last.
His final thought was the same as Marabelle’s. I’m sorry, Jolene.