Disclaimer: I do not own Kaman Rider Double, and I am making no money off of this. This is solely for my own and other's entertainment.

AN: This is set during episode 47 after Shotaro left the agency to find Shroud, and it's from Phillip's point of view.

Warnings: Spoilers up to 47, mentions of shonen-ai (very light), and kinda depressing.

Preparations

When Shroud – okaa-san – said that staying with Shotaro could bring about destruction, I doubt she meant it in the way it has turned out. I'm sure she was afraid Shotaro wouldn't be able to keep up with my growth in power or that our combined power wouldn't be enough, and we would be defeated for good, meaning Museum would win. In that case, she just forgot that Shotaro is the Joker, the wild card who can do anything if he puts his mind to it.

What she didn't count on, though, was our current situation arising. We need to fight and defeat Utopia to save Wakana-nee-san and protect the people of Futo, but the next time we fight as Double will be the last because then I'll disappear. I don't think she ever thought I wouldn't want to fight, that I would almost rather destruction come and face it together than have to leave for good.

Which brings me back to our current situation. Shotaro ran out a bit ago after I finally told him that, after the next fight as Double, my body will dissolve back into the data from which it was made. Aki-chan has set about gathering people for my "going away to study abroad" party so that I can have a chance to say goodbye, and so that they will have an excuse for if, no…when I disappear – because I know I will, I know I have to fight, I know that I'll have to choose my own destruction over the destruction of everything and everyone I love. While she was doing that, I gathered some of my possessions – small mementos really – to give to my friends to remember me by. I've got everyone's together except Shotaro's, though I already know what I'm leaving him. Putting the Lost Driver in the box is the easiest part, he'll know what to do with it when the time comes. What is harder is adding my book, or rather figuring out what to write to him in the book.

It's not that I don't have anything tell him, it's that I have too much I want to say and nearly as much I probably shouldn't or don't have time to say. I want to tell him how the fact that I've changed from the little devil I was when we first met to the person I am today is all thanks to him. I want to tell him just how much I wish things had turned out differently, how much I wish I didn't have to disappear. I want to tell him not to mourn because I'll always be there, even if he can't see or hear me, because I don't think I could leave him behind entirely. I want to tell him to be careful and take care of himself – as he sometimes forgets to do – as well as others. I want to tell him how much I've come to love everything about him and to never lose that kind heart that defines him and was, I think, the reason I started to love him in the first place.

In the end, though, I can't. Not because I'm afraid, no. Telling him all that would be easier to face than the prospect of leaving him. I can't tell him because if he knows before we fight – on the off chance he opens the gift tonight – it'll make it a thousand times harder for him to fight, and if he doesn't find out until after I'm gone – as I suspect will be the case – it might break more of his heart than necessary. Either way I can't put him through that. My note ends up saying, very simply:

"Please protect the city I love Kamen Rider Hidari Shotaro. From your aibou."

Smiling sadly, I place the book beside the Lost Driver before closing and wrapping the box. Then I gather everything up and prepare to smile at the people I can already hear arriving, all the while knowing that in twenty-four hours I may very well not exist anymore.