The common ground is absent of peers.
The sky is absent of sun.
Tiny white stars flicker in solemn vigil, but the dark still overshadows what little light they provide. The moon stretches out with a soft glow, but only the cold mist of a chill reaches to stroke up Robin's back.
Her legs bend over on a log, rigid, with rough bark rubbing her bottom each time she rocks. It neither conforms nor moves with her, and the stench of its rotting festers the longer she stays. Though a place to rest, it brings no comfort. Some things in life are stubborn like that.
Pale fingers pull up a hood. Hair and hems wrap her head, and she grips at the corners under her chin like tugging tight will hold all ends together. Fabricated cover does nothing when sitting in silence means each breath wraps your stilled tongue with the bitter prickle of smoking pine, and the day's death knell sounds in your head. When feeling cold and dead comes from inside.
In contrast, a ring of stone contains embers which glow and thrive, bursting forth with small flames. Her legs are hot. The shifting of her cloak only opens them to further onslaught. Sweat forming beneath her boots seeps salty and stinging into new wounds, and the warmth offered only turns into a reminder of older ones as the sensitive skin of scars begin to sear.
Her wrists remain clamped. Her elbows find her knees to bring her chest against her thighs. Her heels press against grass and wood as she clings to her little piece of lonely earth. She tries her best to stay grounded.
Thoughts of tomorrow come. Of the families that need notified. Of the weapons which must be reassigned. Of how many more breakfast rations will go uneaten. And how many less clinks or rustles of armor she'll recognize as the gait of a particular soldier before she even sees them, ever again.
In solitude; in tempo with the crackling tinder, she weeps.
In grief. In honor. In expression.
In respect of those still breathing and fighting. She must let her weakness out so she may become strong again, strong enough to protect the rest. To make sure all these battles aren't in vain.
Thoughts of tomorrow and more tomorrows come. All the strategy in all the books in all the world; all the creativity and clever in the brightest minds in all the land. What deductions, what calculations, what preparations, can she make to tip the scales - when the tactician's true challenge is...
that death makes everyone equal
and life almost never plays fair?