"Haa….haaa…"
At his last breaths, Solaris still stood with his back shielding his sister, whose eyes had hollowed out from the strain of this unending day.
The black-coated rot beasts had no end. The phantom refused to burn to his flames.
His vision was slowly fading, and with every blink the black wiggled its way closer to him.
Its faint foggy hands caressed his chin and forced him to look at his grin.
"Family is important to you, is it? Don't worry child…" The phantom gave his fading consciousness a laugh as a treat, "You'll still be together with me."
"F-Father…" Solaris muttered as his eyes closed, "M-Master…"
And with two gods downed below him, the black phantom grinned his widest grin and relished in victory.
"Aaaaaah, my patience has gifted me some fun new toys to play with." The Rot Walkers were commanded to approach the bodies, where the goop slithered off their claws and crawled across the ground like webs.
Ironic, given that the phantom would soon find himself bound in a similar material emerging beneath him.
"Gh ghh…!" He shrieked.
Beside him, silently, stood Atrax, "Y-You…? What are you-"
Who proceeded to bound and gag the phantom while raising a pointer finger to the lips of his mask.
"Dealing with a stain. I hope you don't mind that…" As he lowered his hand, behind him approached a certain man, "Lord Solomon."
With the man's towering presence and cold, unfeeling eyes, the Rot Walkers knew better and scattered to the winds, dragging the parasite's mass away with them.
Solomon marched past the Sage as though he wasn't even there and stood over the parasite. The two looked at each other, silent in their knowledge of what was going on.
Solomon then ignored him and faced the north edge of Sancturia, where the winds blew as omen of a great and unfortunate confrontation.
Atrax stood beside him with hands folded in his sleeves and murmured, "You're curious to know what happens next?"
Solomon gave a faint turn of his head in acknowledgement of his presence, sensing him smiling under his mask.
"So am I," He answered for himself, restraining a laugh with what appeared to be a tense grunt, "Wh-What will you choose…Sarajin?"
Chapter -7: On That Day, So Long Ago…
The battlefield was quiet. Sarajin and Justek kept their distance from one another, giving Sarajin a chance to take note of his surroundings.
He remained calm, but stirred with a quivering heart beat once he saw the state his wife was in.
He could tell she had fought hard, and still was even now…But he saw the broken bracelet, and knew that she was going to destroy herself if she kept trying to push herself any further.
There was discord all over the planet, he felt it through every element under his control. And yet…it wasn't evil, but wasn't good either.
The sun had set. The stars were coming out in the night sky.
Sarajin held his fists against his hips and closed his eyes, feeling that he had failed for more reasons than just the one…
"Sorry I was late." He said to Auris.
She cried out, trying to ignite a fire in his heart, "H-He's betrayed us all…! Sent his abominations to all the Tribes…just to lure out the Ten Sages and kill them…!"
Sarajin's eyes widened and he turned to his friend with his skin a little paler.
Justek smirked and did not deny a word, "Are you surprised?"
"No…I guess I'm not." Sarajin had an inkling that Justek was burying his rage for a while now. How could he not? Sarajin got mad at Borealis before. And he wasn't even the direct victim of his actions.
Justek hung his swords to the ground and whispered tempting words in his friend's ears, "You know I am right. The Aurians have hung the world's peace hostage for far too long. Without them…we could finally be free. Your dream…OUR dream…will be a reality."
Sarajin glanced over his shoulder and saw Borealis watching over him. He had never seen him look so pale, so distraught…so guilty.
He had experienced the pain of loss. There was something Justek was hiding.
"...Going after the Ten Sages is one thing. I get it. I do, but…Is that really all you've been doing?"
Justek smiled, "You can already sense the answer."
Sarajin's heart shivered, not wanting to admit that he was sensing things just as he wanted him to. There were fewer Aurians in the city.
Yet, despite feeling a bit of rage inside of himself…Sarajin clutched onto his rationality and looked his friend in the eyes, noticing that despite their gazes meeting, his friend was not looking "at" him.
Because there was a clear and present fog in his eyes.
"There's something I can't see, no…Something he doesn't want me to see."
He began to reach for his sword, as calm as the wind surrounding them. Justek proudly smirked, "So…what do you plan to do with that, old friend?"
Auris chimed in with a weak, desperate cry of, "S-Stop him…! He's…his rage will destroy everything we've worked so hard to achieve…!"
Sarajin acknowledged her with a nod and then turned to Justek to ask a favor, "Before we begin…could you send her to her father so she can rest up?"
"And why should I do that?" Justek inquired.
Sarajin smiled, "Come on, you're not going to drag this out, are you?"
"...Haaaa…" Justek widened his eyes and a rift opened up to carry Auris away as she cried out one last "No…!"
She fell unconscious in Borealis' hands, with Sarajin keeping his focus on his friend as he told the Sage, "She's in your hands now, Borealis. Leave the safety of your people to me."
Borealis nodded, and left with Stonestein while they still could.
Justek raised both his blades slightly and had a dry laugh at these acts, "Why do you still cling to the hope that such a man will ever change? Even now, the only thing that drew him out of his sanctuary was the threat poised at his OWN race."
Sarajin reminded him with a clear diction in his voice, "We made a promise to unite all the Tribes in peace. I've disagreed with Borealis. Even hated him at times. But…we can't rob him of the chance to take that first step. That would make us no better than Ophelia."
"Haaaa…" Justek's heavy sigh was followed by a confident raise of his head and admission of sorts, "Abhorrent though she was, that woman did ultimately have a point. Some people cannot be reasoned with…and so a monster must exist to punish them instead."
He widened his stance and spread his wings, "See me as I am now, old friend, unafraid of anything."
"Then you'll cut me down to get to them?" Sarajin's question turned the towering dragon into a statue of stone.
Sarajin then slowly drew his blade out, ready to point it at Justek's face, "I can see it…You've purposefully clouded your mind so I won't be able to tell what you're thinking."
Justek grinned with a snicker, "And you plan to cut your way through?"
Sarajin nodded.
"It is futile to try and find something that isn't hidden to begin with," Justek's body began to stir, his voice weighed with melancholy, "I have chosen my path…and yet you still walk yours."
Sarajin held his sword in both hands and narrowed his eyes in determination, "I'm not giving up on you. It doesn't matter if you've chosen vengeance, I refuse to believe you're anything but a good man, and an even better friend."
"Then…" Justek reignited his blades and hovered off the ground, "Prepare to pay the consequences for your sentimentality. I…shall hold nothing back this time."
He immediately launched a flame beam at his friend while flapping his wings to get some distance out of the crater.
Sarajin raised a shield of wind to divert the fire around him while gathering more in his blade to cut cleanly through to his friend without hitting him.
Justek pointed a blade forward and Sarajin's eyes darted left and right at the emerging rifts.
He jumped forward between the fading embers with his sword sheathed ready to be drawn again in a flash.
Justek summoned a rift to intercept his cut and then repelled him with a flap of his wings.
The two began their descent with Sarajin pursuing with quick bursts of wind in his wake. Justek concentrated on his eyes, as sharp and refined as diamonds.
"You know, you still haven't told me your name."
"Oh! I'm sorry! My name's Sarajin Stratos!"
As they grew closer to the ground, Justek laid his blades down and ducked under his friend's gallant thrust, which carried a calm wind at his back.
Justek raised his tail and tried to swing his friend into the ground, only for him to hold back his strength with one hand.
Justek pressed down harder until Sarajin's feet caved in the ground beneath him.
Then as he went to escape, Justek spun around and lashed his tail to send him flying away.
Sarajin recovered with a clean landing and took a few slow breaths, his sword withdrawn back into the sheath.
His heart beat slowly to the tempo of the wind. He felt it shiver, as a great battle unfolded in the skies surrounding his home…One that Nimus was involved in, not against them, but for them.
Justek steadied himself and stared down upon his friend unflinchingly. He raised one sword up high, a blade to eclipse and cleave the stars and their heavenly presence upon these lands.
Sarajin hunched forward and waited for the blade to drop before dashing to the left, avoiding a wave of flame.
As Justek raised the blade he opened a rift below Sarajin to carry him up on the tip. Sarajin was surprised, but vaulted straight towards his friend without hesitation.
Justek performed a similar trick with another rift to swing downward, then kept creating more and more rifts while swinging faster and faster, filling the skies with a flurry of dark flame slashes that Sarajin weaved around to the point of not even feeling the heat coming off them.
He then drew his blade and aimed his swing at Justek's blades once they were withdrawn, only for one last rift to redirect Sarajin's flight behind his friend.
Sarajin spun around and performed a couple flips to gracefully avoid the beams that pursued him, cutting the last one down as he landed.
Sarajin then took a couple deep breaths and sheathed his sword fully, thrusting his hand out with a humid warmth filling the atmosphere.
A bountiful display of plant life grew around him and Justek, entangling the dragon's feet and claws in its roots.
Justek tore through with brutish swings and a ceaseless charge ahead, stampeding over the colorful flowers that grew beneath him.
The dew drops bounced warm light off onto Sarajin's body as he held this forest together with ease.
Sarajin kept trying to slow his friend down, but he was choosing the pace of his fight with his determination.
Sarajin got a little more forceful and started ramming newborn trees into his chest from below to wind him. Yet for every gasp he spat up, Justek breathed louder than before in retaliation.
And his swords lit up to burn away at the warm nature lights, keeping all eyes on him as a figure of ghastly rage.
Yet his eyes remained sharp and wise, even when his surroundings were coarse and beastly.
"Not at all," Justek scoffed, "I've never even been outside of my village before today."
He then flinched and bit his teeth down, immediately coming to regret that choice of words when Sarajin flipped around and gasped, "REALLY?!"
He then planted a hand over his mouth and said, "B-But you know so much...!"
"Haaaaaaa...!" Justek slapped the front of his face and grit his teeth. Painfully, he replied, "I just read a lot of books, ok?"
"Oh, so your books have information on all the Tribes?"
"Yeeeeessss...?" Justek slowly peeled his hand off his face.
"Wow! Then you probably know more than my friend back home!" Sarajin's eyes were back to sparkling in awe.
Justek did brush his hair aside and smiled after hearing that, "I mean naturally. I AM one of the smartest people on this planet."
Sarajin pulled his hand back and escaped the small forest as it fell to these immeasurable flames.
Justek took to the skies and shook the burning bark off his scales, slashing waves of fire that kept Sarajin quick on his feet.
But now a few managed to find their mark, and Justek followed up by bombarding him with a spiral of beams from his rifts.
Then he thrust his whole body forward with one sword held at length, drilling Sarajin in the chest to send him hurtling to the ground.
Sarajin landed with his knee half-bent and his heart beating faster.
He felt nature crying, its strength waning in the face of tragedy…
Something had gone wrong. A pure life…had been taken from its cradle.
He felt a tear roll down his cheek, and rose under the shadow of his friend.
Justek scorched the surface with a torrent of flames, forcing Sarajin to take to the skies once more and confront him in a different manner.
He waved his hand down and the sky grew thick with dampness.
He summoned a massive tidal wave to his beck and call, but under his guidance it was not a force of nature, but the means through which he'd douse the flames of hate with a beautiful dance.
Justek swung his swords out to cut into the wave repeatedly, but every time bathed his body in fog and saw less flames emerging from his swords.
Sarajin's hand glided through the air with precision and serenity. He had mastered the sea in all manners, knowing how to match the ebb and flow along with calming it…
"Something has to explain what you are..." Justek mumbled under his breath.
"What did you say?" Sarajin replied.
"Forget it..." Justek shook his hand out beside his face, "Defying all manner of logic, you've managed to earn the right to visit Aquamoria whenever you please. So..."
Justek looked with an admittedly antsy glance his way, "What shall you do next?"
Sarajin stared blankly up towards the sky with his mouth partway agape. Then, with an awkward smile, he hung his head and chuckled, "I-I think I'm going to go home."
Justek's eyes widened bigger than his lens.
"S-Sorry you had to come out here just for this, buddy."
Justek nudged his glasses back up with his pinky and mumbled, "Hmph, it's hardly the bother you're making it out to be."
Sarajin opened one eye and in his innocent way of doing things explained himself, "I'm just tired and confused. Plus, I want to tell my mom the good news!"
Justek tossed his hands up beside his shoulders and shrugged, "Do what you must, I suppose we can save the exploration for another day."
"Thanks for understanding! I'll see you later, alright?" Sarajin then made the preparation for him to go home, taking off into the sky with a hefty gust of wind.
Justek stood his ground, holding his hair down on one hand while craning his head back. He couldn't take his eyes off Sarajin, not until he was far off into the horizon, a dot in comparison to the massive flying city in the distance.
"Hmmm..." He smirked without realizing it.
"Why do I feel...different around you, Sarajin Stratos?" He whispered to himself, "It's like I'm being drawn into your mysterious presence, tempted to unravel what makes you tick."
As the last embers of his blades peetered out, Justek finally resorted to open a rift out into space, sucking the grand deluge away to the last drop.
This briefly stunned Sarajin into breathlessness, where he remembered to steady his heart like the turbulent waters.
But now those waters grew with the addition of tears.
A dream was dead, and many hearts were abandoned to mourn…
His heart trembled, but he held it together through sheer grit.
His body flung itself faster at his friend, with him pulling aside when it seemed another rift would inconvenience him.
Justek shielded himself with a variety of rifts, then complicated the problem further by throwing in his beams, which bounced through other rifts to create a maze-like pattern to dodge around.
Sarajin eventually drew upon the power of the earth to grant him a satellite shield of metal panels to reflect the beams off him while he cut his way closer.
Justek dispelled the rifts whenever he needed to swing his swords. The pressure coming off them was growing fiercer, as though he was letting himself succumb to his ferocity.
Sarajin felt no bite in his attacks, but respected the strength he put on display anyways.
He was always this strong. It was only his doubts that held him back from doing more with it.
And to this day, Sarajin admired him for that. No, not that he was strong. That he doubted himself, but continued moving forward regardless.
What he lacked in humility at the time, he more than made up for by growing as a person alongside him.
Whereas other people would stagnate and cling to their pride, Justek was driven to be better.
It was a struggle, being a better person always is. But he wouldn't be here right now if he had discarded these beliefs.
That's why Sarajin continued to hold his blade and cut through, to understand why his friend had to be so quiet now of all times.
"T-This is what...War looks like?"
"This isn't war, Sarajin...This is a massacre," Justek's glasses fogged up as he craned his head back and sighed, "Something did this. With a force more powerful than hundreds of thousands of years of hatred, it slaughtered hundreds in a single minute, and left a permanent stain on the world."
"And with that blood, they wrote a message to the world...'Cease your violent ways, or your blood will join theirs.'"
"And ever since, there's been no war."
"Aah, aaaah...!" Sarajin suddenly scrambled to his feet and turned away running. Getting a few yards away from this lake of blood, he bent over and grabbed his knees, gasping for air.
Justek approached him and Sarajin turned around yelling, "W-Why did you show me this?!"
Justek stood there completely still and told him the brutal truth, "YOU didn't want to be ignorant. Sometimes that means learning unsavory truths."
"I-I wish I hadn't learned any of this...!" Sarajin clutched his hands against his chest and shook his head around, "The war, people full of hatred for one another, this blood staining the planet...! It shouldn't be this way! It's wrong! It's wrong!"
Sarajin shivered and mumbled aloud, "What made the world like this, Justek?"
"That's something only the people long before our time can answer," Justek said reluctantly, "And even long after we're gone, that same question will be asked again and again."
"So then..." Sarajin cracked his head to the left and grit his teeth in a frown, "Violence will just keep happening unless the problem is solved?"
Justek raised a brow curiously and then nodded, "That is about the gist of it."
"T-There has to be something we can do to fix this!" Sarajin proclaimed.
"We?" Justek sputtered in surprise, "What do you possibly think two people alone can hope to do against all the hatred in the world?"
He swung his arm out towards the pool of blood and raised his voice, "It took a monster of unfathomable force to make the fighting cease and look what it cost to do so!"
He then crossed his arms and scowled, "Even ignoring the hatred of the world, what about the Rot? Nobody can stop it."
"How can I just stand by and do nothing?!" Sarajin screamed with incredible force that rocked Justek to his bones.
His face red and breaths ragged, Sarajin looked like he was on the verge of crying, "I-I can't do that. I...I just can't, Justek."
With the rifts dwindling in number, Sarajin swiftly pulled his hand up and tore up a large chunk of the ground to clobber Justek from below and stagger his concentration.
He then dove between the fading rifts and tried to clash with his blade, only for Justek to drop his blades and grab Sarajin in both of his claws.
He then threw him at the ground and flapped his wings to make his swords drop faster.
Upon impact Sarajin with the ground was about to be pinned between the crossed blades when his quick reflexes forged pillars of the hardest metal he could think of to crash into them.
The blades cut a few feet in before stopping, and Sarajin raised himself up off the ground where he watched the blades be returned to his friend's hands through rifts.
With a steady flap of his wings, Justek descended, hardly showing signs of wear. But it was all a facade, Sarajin could sense it deep inside that both him and Auris have managed to build up damage on him.
The ground trembled beneath his feet. The roar of the land was aimed against its enemies.
Fighting on…not giving an inch to whoever challenged their might.
Justek projecting this resilience was impressive, but Sarajin was not going to slow down to any attempt at intimidation.
He chopped his right hand open towards the sky and the atmosphere crackled with thunder and electricity.
Justek looked up as the dark skies flashed with strobe lights and grinned. He glared down his friend and pointed his swords at the ground.
"...S-So what are we supposed to do?"
"This is your mission, you need to figure that out," Justek nevertheless waved his hand around and suggested, "But one word of advice, you need to learn to speak up more."
Sarajin raised his brows as Justek remarked upon his displeasing behavior, "And don't tell me you can't."
"I-I know that, but..." Sarajin gripped the side of his arm and muttered, "I was just...scared."
Not anymore. Now stood a man's eyes roaring wide open with courage, the strength of his gaze furthered by flashes of lightning gathering around him.
The city of progress had ground to a halt against a terrifying horde.
But then came the roar of unyielding steel, and the unchallenged advance of frost to fight back.
No hesitation. Enemies were now allies.
Sarajin felt their efforts reverberating in his heart and put everything he got into chopping forward.
The atmosphere flashed with navy light and down came an arrow that split through the heavens with a deafening thunderclap.
Ever proud Voltneir would gaze up at the night sky and shed a tear as the lightning fell to smite Justek with all its might.
This pristine flash of raw power consumed him but did nothing to divide the ground beneath his feet.
What began in a flash ended in an instant, leaving Justek smoldering with thick gray smoke off his unmoved scales. His knee tried to bend, but he stood taller and prouder than ever.
Static flickered off his body as he raised his swords once more and smirked, huffing a ring of smoke out between his fangs.
Sarajin's hand hovered out from his chest and after a quick wince he narrowed his eyes and darted forward with a sword drawn to strike at Justek's blade.
His friend dropped the sword and held back his attack on his palm, shoving him off gently and then using his other sword to blow him back.
Justek kept whipping his sword around to toss Sarajin around in a major hurricane. Then he waved his flames into it to entangle him further.
"I pity our circumstances, Sarajin."
"Huh?" Sarajin replied with a light tilt of the head.
With a forced smirk he nudged his glasses up and muttered, "If only our fathers understood who we were, instead of trying to force us to be who they want us to be."
He then pinched the bridge of his glasses and slowly peeled them off, a dry laugh slipping free, "But who am I kidding? I don't even understand who I am anymore..."
His eyes were crystal clear with the light tears forming inside, "Sarajin I...I've been grappling with a troublesome problem lately. For the life of me, I just can't figure out why you look up to me."
He folded his glasses up and laid them to rest at his feet, "I'm just as ignorant as you were starting off. All my so-called knowledge came from these...outdated books."
"And all my power can do is strike fear into people's hearts."
Sarajin laid his hand atop Justek's and surprised him with how warm it felt. Sarajin then looked into his eyes and shook his head, "You're really smart Justek. You pick up on new things quickly and you've got a WAY better eye for detail than I do."
"And you, and &%^ $&*[Pix], you're able to say what's on your mind with no difficulty. Any time I try to talk to adults, they've treated me like I'm a child..." Sarajin's expression turned sour as he looked away, dejected, "And...they were right."
He scooted away from Justek, "When Ophelia questioned me...I didn't have an answer. Because even now, I'm still ignorant. A-And...It made me realize just how useless I am."
His fist tightened up by his hip, "How can I hope to bring the world together if my words won't reach anyone's heart?"
"I don't understand enough about the world, or the complex emotions and dreams everyone living in it has. And even if I did, I would just shrivel up when faced with hostility...!"
He shook his head firmly and looked Justek in the eyes, "I don't want to be this way anymore, Justek. I need to keep learning and grow stronger! I..."
There was a brief glint of tenderness in his eyes as he mumbled, "I want to be more like you."
Fearless, even as a thousand embers threaten to swallow him whole. Sarajin reversed the storm by snapping his fingers and turning the winds into absolute zero frost through the hold the fire had over it.
He then fell onto the rim of the spiral standing between him and his friend and skated forward at quicker speeds, building up blinding momentum until their widened eyes met at the center.
Sarajin swung his sword and Justek almost compelled himself into meeting it. Instead, he let his face suffer a scar and watched Sarajin tumble onto the ground behind him.
Sarajin fell on one knee and held his sword out horizontally, gasping for breath as a few beads of sweat formed over his brows.
He closed his eyes and tried to cool down.
Imagining the harsh frigid wastes, he could feel a lone figure fighting amidst the snow.
Having found her voice, this fairy danced to defend these lands without any hesitation.
Sarajin took deep breaths and stood cautiously to face his friend. Choking on a gasp, he tensed up his grip around his sword, and together, the two of them ignited their blades, putting burnt shadows over their eyes.
They raised their weapons towards the stars and swung out, lashing towering waves of fire against one another rapidly.
And inferno coasted through the lands from the base, splashing against their feet and rising to blacken their visions in smoke.
And as the temperature reached the Apex of what the atmosphere around them could tolerate, they cut the flames off and let the wind scatter the inferno away.
"I want to believe you know what you're doing, dragging us out here into the hostile wastelands of fire...But my knowledge yet again fails me. Why do you need a horse?"
"Well, Valflame told me that an Ashen Mare can ride through any rough environment, even the thick cloud of ash around the volcano." Sarajin spelled out without hesitation.
"Did he now?" Justek wondered, slightly in disbelief.
"Mmm..." Sarajin pressed his lips shut and then glanced aside, "He didn't mention the volcano specifically, but..."
He swung his hands out and expressed his belief with a solemn plea, "But I want to believe he's leading me in the right direction."
Justek closed his eyes and slowly nodded, "I would hope so. It would've made our job easier if even one of those other leaders were this cooperative from the start."
But his belief was followed by a minor sigh, which Sarajin picked up on and remarked accordingly, "But...?"
Justek's eyes peered open and looked aside, with him then raising his head and nudging his glasses back into place, "He commands an army and more than likely has slain people on the battlefield personally. What makes him different from a warmonger like Colrez?"
Sarajin crossed his arms and closed his eyes halfway, "I didn't get the sense that Valflame fights for the fun of it like Colrez does. He sounded...tired both times I talked to him. Like he wants to get out of this war more than anyone but has no choice if he wants to keep his people safe."
"And you believe him?"
When Sarajin envisioned the leader's tired face and the words of his dream, he could safely nod his head and reply, "Yeah...I trust him."
"Alright," Justek said with a quiet tone of defeat, "Then let's hope this trust pays off."
Sarajin's blade had tasted from the wellspring of rage his friend shared, deeper, brighter, more righteous than heaven.
He wanted this hatred to be the only thing that burned into Sarajin's heart. And Sarajin was starting to take that into consideration.
The fireswept lands far off were settling down. A god cut through the man made terrors to give the people he once shunned a second chance.
A boy's cries went unanswered by father or mother, as the latter's vulnerability shook even his great courage.
Sarajin was steadily shaking more and more as he realized that…Maybe his wife's assessment was correct.
Justek was lax and loose with his confidence, "I am enjoying this quite a lot, Sarajin."
Sarajin stirred with a look of surprise towards his friend's smile.
"We should have fought sooner…In less uncomfortable times."
Justek shed a single tear, looking down upon his friend. He no longer needed his strength to safeguard him. He had grown into a fine man.
Deep down…he wished they could be those curious children…one more time.
He opened his eyes with a sigh, "Isn't it time we stopped taking a walk down memory lane?"
Sarajin reaffirmed his stance with a nod and drew his sword, unveiling his Light Conduit Form with the gentleness of a morning breeze radiating off him.
"Are you ready, Justek? Because I'm coming for your heart…your true heart!"
"Heh…" Justek then took his sword and cut himself across the chest so the blood would leak out onto part of the blades.
He then set them ablaze, creating an unholy, bright crimson, "It'd be a disservice to your efforts if I let you win easily, wouldn't you agree?"
Sarajin smiled as his spine shivered. He then pointed his whole body forward and the two friends began their final staredown…
Next Time: My Choice