Pierre did not remember how or where he went, and how long he was going. In a condition of complete stupefaction and bewilderment, seeing nothing around him, he moved his legs in company with the others till they all stopped, and he stopped.

There was one idea all this time in Pierre’s head. It was the question: Who, who was it really that was condemning him to death? It was not the men who had questioned him at the first examination; of them not one would or obviously could do so. It was not Davoust, who had looked at him in such a human fashion. In another minute Davoust would have understood that they were doing wrong, but the adjutant who had come in at that moment had prevented it. And that adjutant had obviously had no evil intent, but he might have stayed away. Who was it, after all, who was punishing him, killing him, taking his life—his, Pierre’s, with all his memories, his strivings, his hopes, and his ideas? Who was doing it? And Pierre felt that it was no one’s doing. It was discipline, and the concatenation of circumstances. Some sort of discipline was killing him, Pierre, robbing him of life, of all, annihilating him.


  By PanEris using Melati.

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