A chill froze the back of Atom. He was not even achieving to move a muscle, nor even to open the mouth.
Only one idea was occupying his thought.
What should he do?
No… What could he do?
A sensation of anguish crushed him as a mountain impossible to climb. But even without that pressure, he was not finding exit.
He limited himself to straighten the back and direct the gaze toward the old Percy, who was maintaining the head bowed and was not emitting any response.
Atom was found cornered.
He could not trust in anyone. That man, the same that now was remaining in silence, had sold his mother for a few coins of gold.
Not existed escape.
They were condemned.
The desperation that was invading him made him feel that he was walking on a thin rope suspended between two skyscrapers.
"You and you…" Percy raised the hand and pointed to two guards that were found behind him. "Bring the slave girl."
The two guards began to advance toward Atom. Before that the children could even try to escape, they pushed with force to Atom, who was maintaining himself in front of Aurore, and held the girl by the arms.
One of the guards grabbed to Atom and threw him against the ground with violence.
"Aurore!" shouted Atom hysterical.
"Ow…" exclaimed Aurore upon feeling the roughness of the other guard, but then she kept silence.
A slight smile appeared on her lips.
She nodded toward Atom, as if she wanted to say to him: "Everything will be fine."
Atom began to fight with an uncontrolled fury, trying to free himself from the soldier that was maintaining him immobilized.
"What?! Only be obedient!"
"Remove your hands from me, bastard!"
The body of Atom was remaining completely immobilized under the weight of the common soldier, much more strong than him.
He tried to incorporate himself, but he was not achieving to move even a single muscle. The force of the guard was maintaining him trapped without possibility of escape.
The other guard continued dragging to Aurore toward the Inquisitor. Once in front of him, he retreated a few steps and knelt.
He joined the hands and realized a deep reverence, showing absolute respect to the Inquisitor.
This nodded with brevity and activated a strange device that emerged from a ring in his finger. The artifact was consisting of a thick chain of iron with a great loop at the end. Three straps of leather were united to the chain, arranged one next to the other.
The Inquisitor delivered the device to Percy and ordered him that he utilize it to tie to Aurore. The old man took the shackles without showing any emotion and obeyed the order.
The instructions of an Inquisitor could not be questioned, neither in that estate nor in any other corner of the world.
To disobey was meaning the death immediate. That was the level of authority that was exercising the Holy Church.
Aurore directed a last gaze to Atom.
She smiled with sweetness, as if she wanted to demonstrate to him that everything was under control, and nodded again.
Percy, with the face inexpressive, placed the artifact in the back of Aurore.
He adjusted the three straps of leather around the shoulders, the abdomen, and the hips of the girl.
The face of Aurore contracted slightly upon feeling the pressure. After assuring the straps with buckles metallic, Percy retreated a few steps with awkwardness and lowered the gaze toward the ground.
Zola, who until that moment had not done more than observe the scene with an expression apathetic and bored, approached to Aurore and took the chain that was hanging from her back.
The gaze of Atom, full of panic, directed itself to the priest Zola, who was inspecting the shackles with indifference. Each time that he was tightening a buckle, the face of the girl was contracting with pain.
Zola, without paying attention to the chaos that was surrounding him, held the chain with firmness and jumped toward the sky swimmer, where the Inquisitor was awaiting him.
He mounted with ease, as if he had done it hundreds of times. The silver armor that he was dressing reflected the light with such intensity that it was blinding the sight.
The sky swimmer extended its enormous wings.
From the height, Aurore, tied by the back, directed a fixed gaze toward Atom. She was smiling. Her ruby eyes were transmitting a clear message: "Goodbye."
Her long white hair was agitating with force by the wind that were generating the fins of the sky swimmer.
Atom was remaining immobile.
"Aurore!"
His heartbreaking shout echoed as the scream of a soul torn, a sound so chilling and full of pain that it barely was seeming human.
For an instant, it seemed that everything was in silence.
They took her…
Atom held her, cared for her, protected her… and she was torn from his being as if his love was not mattering to the world in the slightest.
He could not think.
His shoulders were shaking without control while the sobs were shaking him, incapable of forming words coherent.
His hands were trembling as leaves in a storm, and his breathing became erratic, as if he had forgotten how to do something so basic as to breathe.
The pain was so intense that it was feeling as if he were drowning. It was unbearable and was crushing his spirit as if someone had torn out his heart and was squeezing it without mercy.
Never he imagined that his heart could hurt so much. He clutched the chest with force, incapable of containing the state autodestructive of his emotions that were threatening with destroy him.
The tears were running by his cheeks and blurred the sight until the world became a blur without sense of colors.
He could not breathe while he was feeling the torrent of emotions that was invading him. A rage that was burning as a wildfire uncontrollable, a pain that was flooding and drowning everything in its path; a guilt corrosive that was shaking the foundations of his existence; and a regret that was destroying and razing years of development and growth as a hurricane unstoppable.
He could feel these emotions, that were seeming natural disasters causing havoc in his heart, destroying his sanity piece by piece.
Now, all that was remaining to him was a black hole of emptiness and regret.
He had no one to blame but to himself.