Fanfic / Silent Partner, Unfinished Business

Cover art by @Groove1121 on Twitter

Silent Partner, Unfinished Business is a 2019 Death Note Fix Fic by Huitzil, featuring secondary elements of a Crossover with 100 Bullets.

The Death Note wielded by Light Yagami makes Misora Naomi kill herself — yet by a fluke her body is promptly retrieved and she is resuscitated, though not before she sustained serious damage. Naomi is covered in scars, stripped of the memories leading to her attempt, no longer able to speak more than a couple stammered words at a time, and in mourning over her fiancé; but she forces herself through despair after a visit by a mysterious Agent Graves, who offers her a chance for revenge: a handgun chambered in an unusual caliber, 100 rounds, and a promise that she will not be held responsible for any crime committed with this weapon ^note and this synopsis encompasses almost the whole extent of the crossover. With her amnesia putting Naomi back to square one in her knowledge of Kira's identity, she accepts L's offer of a place on the investigation, and his request to emotionally engage with captive Amane Misa, which ends up working far beyond the expectations...

A shorter sequel, Misa Amasora's Pure Love Memorial, was published in 2020. Much lighter on action and heavier on character moments (and on erotica), it explores the repercussions of the events of the first part and presumably will serve as a bridge to the planned third instalment.

Spoilers are unmarked roughly up to the halfway point of Silent Partner, Unfinished Business, when the Yotsuba Prosperity Council Arc starts to really get Off the Rails.

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Tropes specific to the work:

• Adaptational Badass: In the original, Misora Naomi gets all of a single episode, ending with her killing herself due to misplaced trust in Light Yagami. Here, she survives and demonstrates why she used to be an FBI high-flyer.
• Adaptational Intelligence: Amane Misa. Not just a ditzy Kira fangirl, she provides some acute insights, sometimes arriving to them via unconventional ways.
• All Myths Are True: In one conversation with Naomi, Misa starts saying that she knows vampires aren't real, and then they both realize that no, in a world with Death Notes and shinigami they don't know that vampires aren't real.
• The Atoner: Misa, for having been the Second Kira.
• Batman Gambit: Isamu's negotiation with the Chairman follows his script to a letter, and in the end Egawas not only avoid harm from Yakuza, but gain them as somewhat subordinate allies. The scene showcases his own Manipulative Bastard nature and that he doesn't merely play the second fiddle to his more ruthless wife.
• Battle Couple: The amount of shared participation in gun fights, car chases and forced entries is higher than average for a romantic couple.
• Better Manhandle the Murder Weapon: Inverted. Because you are immune to prosecution for any crime committed with the Minutemen pistol, you want to have fingerprints and gunshot residue connected to you.
• Beyond Redemption: Before getting full knowledge of how Kira's powers work and what Light did, Misa believed that he could be redeemed. By the final confrontation in the hotel, she is disabused of this notion.
• Boom, Headshot!: A .50 caliber bullet from Watari's rifle not so much penetrates Isamu Egawa's skull, as wipes it from existence entirely.
• But for Me, It Was Tuesday: Kitamura doesn't even recognize Naomi, despite his words leading to her fiancé's death and her being disfigured and brain damaged.
• Call-Back: From the penultimate chapter to the first one. Misa's last conversation with Light ends with her concluding that he doesn't care about her to such a degree that he has no idea what she even does for living. The readers, of course, found that out as early as the second paragraph of his narration in the story, when in his thoughts Light referred to Misa, an actress, as an “idol singer”.
• Chekhov's Gun: Starting at a certain point in the story, Misa constantly complains about feeling cold. We later learn that it is a consequence of her brief clinical death from hypothermia.
• Comically Missing the Point: No, Misa, it would not be physically hard for Naomi to kill you if you became possessed by an evil entity.
• The Conscience: The fact that Misa used to be the Second Kira terrifies her, and she frequently looks for external confirmation that she is not making further mistakes, chiefly from Naomi. Ryuzaki thinks it goes the other way too, not trusting Naomi to be alone with Death Note pages in the sequel.
• Cruel and Unusual Death: Light drowns himself in a toilet to obtain immunity from Death Note and frame Misa. The method was chosen for practical considerations (a panic door to sever the chain on his wrist and good chances of being saved), but its Cruel And Unusual nature helped him sell the story of a vengeful ex-lover.
• Crusading Widow: The only thing that keeps Naomi in recovery is the thought of seeing her fiancé. The only thing that gets her out of it is the thought of avenging his death.
• Cuddle Bug: Misa, after being released from her confinement, constantly hugs everyone. She hopes nobody notices that it is because of her not being very steady on her feet.
• Cycle of Revenge: Discussed in the final conversation between Naomi and Soichiro. She offers her life in repayment for killing Light. He refuses.
• Death by Adaptation: Ryuk, of all characters.
• Death by Irony: The circumstances of Kira's death closely mirror how Kitamura died through Kira's use of a Death Note.
• Do Not Adjust Your Set: Light asks Ryuzaki if the latter can repeat his performance of a region-wide broadcast from L's first appearance. Ryuzaki says that it would be difficult without cooperation of the police, and suggests they simply buy commercials on every channel.
• Dramatic Irony:
  • A small, but heartbreaking example: in her suicide attempt Naomi lost some of her memories, and at the beginning of the story refers to Raye in present tense in her thoughts.
  • Ryuzaki willingly cedes the leadership of the investigation to Light.
• Engineered Public Confession: What Misa ends up doing to Light.
• "Eureka!" Moment: Naomi's sudden realization that Misa indeed has been the Second Kira is spurred on by Love Epiphany of them being in love with each other, in a strange chain of insight. The logic is sound, but is not explained for a whole chapter.
• Even Evil Has Standards: There is a Master Forger in the sequel who does not care about breaking the law to produce fake documents, but under no circumstances will he make a driving license for you if you haven't passed a driving exam.
• Failure Hero: In her darker moments, Naomi feels that this is her role in life, and that she would never be able to prevent evil, stop it, or even make it pay for its acts. She is wrong.
• Feed the Mole: Oops, by sending Ryuzaki and Light harmless evidence for analysis which includes Rem's ashes, Naomi and Misa tipped Kira off that Misa is no longer protected by Rem! They know that Light is Kira, and he knows that they know, but he doesn't know that they know the significance of Rem's demise.
• Foreshadowing: In her second-level cover story to Yotsuba Prosperity Council Misa says that she broke her left pinky and ring finger. These are the ones she ends up losing.
• For Want Of A Nail: Apart from the crossover elements, the event that drives the divergence of Silent Partner, Unfinished Business from canon is that Naomi was resuscitated after her Death Note-induced suicide attempt.
• Friendly Enemy: Despite the clashes both in their operations and in their values, L and Agent Graves have a cordial relationship.
• Fright Deathtrap: A complicated version happens to Kitamura. Naomi sets out to shoot him, but in the critical moment her resolve fails her, and she empties her pistol into the ceiling. His heart gives out from fright, and he dies from a heart attack. But what actually transpires is that unbeknownst to her, Naomi was compelled by Death Note to be the cause of Kitamura's death, unintentionally resisted the compulsion, and the heart attack was the default failure mode of impossible circumstances of death.
• Gambit Pileup: The climax of the Yotsuba Arc involves competing plans by: Naomi and Misa; Egawas and Yakuza; Light Yagami; Kira Investigation Team (which the same Light needs to lead without arousing suspicion). The culmination of Silent Partner, Unfinished Business as a whole involves plans by all of the former minus the neutralized Egawas-and-Yakuza team.
• Green-Eyed Monster: Averted. Light doesn't care about Misa falling for Naomi, except for tactical considerations. (His narration makes it exceedingly clear that he never loved or even liked her, though.)
• Handicapped Badass: Despite a damaged knee, hearing loss, aphasia, and other handicaps, Naomi still is the most dangerous person in a fight in the story, due to her marksmanship, hand-to-hand training, and tactical mind.
• Happy Flashback: To the times when the loved ones of the heroines were alive, Misa with her father or Naomi with Raye.
• Harsher in Hindsight: Almost about an aneurysm, even. Misa, who relinquished her memories and is ignorant of Death Notes at that point, listens to the wiretapped Prosperity Council meeting and writes down their decision in a (mundane) notebook: “Santoro... Zansai... stroke.”
• Hemo Erotic: Misa has a thing for blood. It's not a violent or decadent variation of the trope, but her feelings about the matter are intense. 
• Heroic BSoD: Unlike the original, Misa is extremely distressed upon recovering her memories and remembering how she willfully killed a lot of people, to the point where she actually vomits from the thought.
• Hollywood Healing: Averted. The repercussions of a failed suicide include, but are not limited to: coma and subsequent muscle atrophy, scars, limited mobility, hearing loss, and a brain lesion which leads to almost total inability to translate thoughts into words. The effects of Misa's harsh confinement don't disappear overnight either. Or the effects of her clinical death.
• Humans Are Bastards: In her narration Rem is absolutely disgusted with humans. It is understandable, when she spent most of the time on Earth interacting with people like Light Yagami and Egawas.
• If It's You, It's Okay: At one point, Naomi ponders if her sexuality is “straight with one exception”. Among other options are a bisexual or a lesbian who had been unbelievably bad at it previously.
• If You Kill Him, You Will Be Just Like Him!: Mostly averted. In his last moments Light tried to invoke this trope to talk his way out, and Naomi didn't buy it. And those who condemn her for his cold-blooded execution still don't say they are the same, even Light's father.
• Immune to Mind Control: One would think that an immunity to being killed with a Death Note means an immunity to mind control, but it's only partial: an entry can guide your actions as somebody's cause of death, even if that's only a rough and escapable compulsion.
• Implausible Deniability: Panicking Light tries to spin the events of the climax as Misa turning people against him — after the investigation team overheard his implicit admission of being Kira over her microphone.
• Insistent Terminology: The Second Kira and Misa are different individuals. In the sequel Naomi thinks that Ryuzaki didn't pick up on her grimace at his conflation of the two, but he corrects himself from referring to certain actions as Misa's soon after.
• It's All About Me: Such a mindset seems to be the defining trait of everybody who takes up the mantle of Kira in this story.
• It's the Journey That Counts: Misa realizes that although the trip she took with Watari in Love Memorial turned out to be useless for practical purposes in the end, she learned a valuable lesson about trust and respect. Naomi's sham investigation with Ryuzaki has yielded unexpected benefits for the Kira Case, but also given her An Aesop about bottling up emotions, in full accordance with the sequel's Christmas Episode status.
• Japanese Christian: Misa's mother was Catholic and her father was Buddhist. Misa's loose usage of Christian symbolism is because she never figured out which she believed.
• Kuleshov Effect: Invoked by name.

Misa: So, you know, the Kuleshov effect is an actress's best friend. You gotta know when NOT to act, and let the audience do it for you.

• Lampshade Hanging: Where could Naomi get on short notice bracelets with intricate gem-swapping clockworks? Probably from the same place Light got his watch with a hidden compartment.
• Laser-Guided Amnesia: Just as in canon, Misa loses all her memories of the Death Note with no ill effects. Very much averted with Naomi, who loses memories of everything she did in Japan, and those that return are confused and jumbled.
  • Congruent Memory: Intentionally invoked by Light. Appearing to help her retrace her steps, he re-enacts the encounter where he discovered Naomi's name and revealed his identity to her. When Naomi remembers the real event, she assumes her memory just filled it in from when her and Light retraced her steps.
• Libation for the Dead: Some symbolism can be found in how Light Yagami gets an inadvertent one, when a bottle of lemon sour shochu gets knocked over during an argument in the wrap-up meeting for his case.
• Malicious Slander: Watari offers Misa a file on Raye Penber's malfeasances, each of them made up.
• Mercy Kill: Ryuzaki silently assents to be mercy killed rather than be mind-controlled by a Death Note entry. That it was revealed to be a non-lethal step in a complex plan comes as a pleasant surprise to him.
• Miranda Rights: Due to rote memorization, this statement is the sole thing Naomi can say without stuttering and grasping for words. She uses it to pretend to be an American law enforcer with poor Japanese language skills during an armed stand-off.
• Miscarriage of Justice: Gets more attention than in the original, both thematically and as explicitly discussed by characters; for example, Naomi bringing up Kira's murder of a person who falsely confessed (and the fact that it is only one case from a long list) is what starts to chip at Misa's support of Kira's actions.
• Mission Control: Nominally, people in the control room of the HQ. In the sense of a more immediate field assistance, Wedy and Misa share the role during the impromptu heist, as the technical expert and laser microphone operator respectively, an occasion of which Misa is rather proud.
• Multitasked Conversation: Light talks to Nabiki as L, and also tries to convey information to her as Kira while being subtle enough that it wouldn't tip off the rest of the investigation. He fails in the second part by being too subtle.
• Mysterious Backer: The shadowy organization which bankrolls L.

Ryuzaki: Where did you think the money for this complex came from, Soichiro? Is solving crimes that lucrative?

• Mythology Gag: Light finishes his Crossword Puzzle in 6 minutes and 40 seconds “with a dramatic flourish that was way too over-the-top for simply writing something down”.
• No Poker Face: Light internally mocks Misa for how terrible her poker face is when playing with her, Ryuzaki, and Matsuda. He has no idea she wasn't reacting to her cards.
• Not So Stoic: Ryuzaki rarely displays emotions; he stoically meets a bullet to his chest, and continues his Insufferable Genius act as soon as he finds out it was not fatal. But in events prior to those he was badly shaken by Light almost dying, and in Love Memorial the stress that has been accumulating since before the Kira Case catches up with L, and he undergoes a full-blown panic attack over discovering previously unaccounted Death Note pages.
• No, You Hang Up First: Light and imprisoned Misa engage in this trope through Naomi. Whose injured brain is being slowly cooked by the effort of relaying speech.
• Our Vampires Are Different: In-Universe. Misa apparently did modeling work for White Wolf, publishers of Vampire: The Masquerade, and is upset that they took out Malkavians since she used to portray one. When she gets a fake name for her police badge, she uses "Aiko Malkavian".
• Outliving One's Offspring: Unlike the original, Soichiro outlives his son (and also learns about his identity as the original Kira). The results for Soichiro's psyche are predictable.
• Pacifist: Wedy makes it really clear that she doesn't work with killers.
• Parting-Words Regret: Watching Misa on set play the soul of her character saying farewells to her love, Naomi mournfully looks back on how her last words to Raye were “oh God shut the curtains before you go”.
• Pietà Plagiarism: Naomi with Ryuzaki. Doubles as a reference to the anime opening.
• Poor Communication Kills: Naomi's expressive aphasia makes communication difficult in the best circumstances, and she relies on Misa as an interpreter. It's observed multiple times that she can't negotiate her way out of delicate situations, like when she's trying to get past Rem to kill the Egawas.
• Porn with Plot: The sequel gets very, very explicit at times.
• Relationship Sabotage: In the sequel Misa, afraid of losing Naomi's love, decides to retroactively sabotage Naomi's past relationship with her late fiancé by digging up dirt on him. Thankfully, she realizes what an awful idea this is in time.
• Resurrection Revenge: What animates Naomi after being revived (by mundane means) and meeting Agent Graves.
• Revenant Zombie: Misora Naomi's metaphor for herself in as many words.
• Role-Ending Misdemeanor:
  • In-Universe, one of the ways Kira's presence changed the world is that Hollywood became as intolerant of drugs as Japan, in fear of their stars dropping dead mid-production if Kira judged them criminals. The instance mentioned is Robert Downey Jr. being let go from his role in Iron Man. How the prospects of Marvel Cinematic Universe are affected is left as an exercise to the reader.
  • Of course, there is also Misa, who thanks to her active and polarizing role in the events surrounding the Kira Knowledge broadcast, is now radioactive to the domestic movie industry.
• Rules Lawyer: Everybody who takes possession of a Death Note to a larger or smaller extent. The prize probably goes to Egawas, who make use of the rule that one entry cannot induce two deaths as a way how pregnant Nabiki can be immune from being killed with a Death Note.
• Running Gag:
  • People struggle to remember the word “aphasia”.
  • Aiber seemingly conjures pina coladas out of thin air.
• Sequel Hook: Love Memorial ends with a first glimpse at The Conspiracy behind the projects of L and Minutemen.
• Shoot the Hostage Taker: As an unfortunate Kira cultist finds out, proper trigger discipline is a liability when you try to use a Human Shield. A death spasm won't pull the trigger if there is no finger on the trigger.
• Shut Up, Hannibal!: Light, when cornered, tries to appeal to Matsuda's previous doubts about Kira possibly doing the right thing. After everything which happened by that point, Matsuda is not receptive to the argument, and punctuates it with a punch to Light's stomach.
• "Shut Up" Kiss: After starting rambling on the Ferris wheel, Misa wishes Naomi did that to her. Her wish is soon granted.
• Silent Partner: Quite fittingly. Out of necessity, not affectation, Naomi has to rely on Misa to speak for her.
• Skewed Priorities: Ryuzaki is probably happy for Naomi and Misa after their proposal to each other, but it is definitely a shame cake was dropped to the floor in the process.
• Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism: One of the central themes of the work is justice vs. revenge. Silent Partner is... not very idealistic on this axis. But neither does it fall into a hopeless cynicism of a Crapsack World. It doesn't spiral into an endless Cycle of Revenge, Vengeance Feels Empty is averted, and the characters have a hope for the future, even if they are left physically and mentally scarred, grieving their dead, and were forced to Earn Your Happy Ending.
• The Sociopath: Naomi notes that Egawas used Death Note to force two of the Prosperity Council co-conspirators to swallow poison and bring Egawas escape vehicles not because they had a particular need for two cars, but simply to have a safety margin.
• Spared by the Adaptation: Obviously, Naomi Misora starts the story alive. She survives to the end, as well as L, Watari, Soichiro, Wedy, Aiber. By implication, all post-timeskip characters and nameless victims who Kira would have killed in that time span are also spared. If judged solely by the bodycount, Silent Partner is notably Lighter and Softer than the source material.
• Speak Now or Forever Hold Your Peace: Deliberately left in, as a bait for anybody wishing to disrupt the ceremony, so the timing of this potential disruption would be known in advance. Nobody attempts anything in the end.
• Spy Speak: Watari insists on using code names for targets over the comms, even if nobody else on the investigation team bothers.
• Stepford Smiler: Nabiki Egawa is polite, cheerful, and friendly; also a ruthless sociopath.
• Stupid Sacrifice: Rem takes the lives of several Yakuza to save Misa, and this action by shinigami rules kills her... while Misa and Naomi had prepared an ambush for those Yakuza and had good chances of pulling it off.
• Sword over Head: The firearm variety. Twice Naomi holds at gunpoint people who betrayed her. In the first instance the trope is played in full accordance with the description, her firing away from the target at the last second. The second time she places the bullet firmly into the target's eye socket.
• Talking to the Dead: There is a moment where Misa visits the graves of her parents to update them on everything that happened since the start of the plot. And to introduce her girlfriend to them.
• Thwarted Escape: An uncommon example of heroes thwarting villains. After Egawas escape to a police station from a home invasion by Naomi and Misa, the latter two get brought to the same station under arrest... and are rapidly set free with their weapons returned to them.
• Trial Run Crime: The same day she gets out of the hospital, Naomi tests whether she really can't be prosecuted for a crime carried out with a Minutemen pistol — by committing the crime of simply discharging the pistol into the pavement in a park.
• Unholy Matrimony: While Egawas display an astonishing level of callousness towards everybody else, they seem to genuinely love each other. When her husband is killed, Nabiki is absolutely devastated.
• Unreliable Narrator: To a certain degree, Light's point of view, because his extreme narcissism makes him overestimate his abilities. For example, Light is sure that he nailed a poker face when shocked by seeing Naomi alive, and that his deception with World of Warcraft went unnoticed. In reality, Ryuzaki saw through both these things, even if he ultimately dropped the ball.
• Weapon for Intimidation: After going rogue, Misa carries a blank gun with her. Except it's not purely for intimidation, because at a close range even blank rounds can be dangerous.
• What the Hell, Hero?: Misa calls out Rem (who is vaguely heroic as far as shinigami go) for honoring Gelus' sacrifice for her sake by handing her a weapon of mass destruction and standing back as Misa turned into a serial killer.
• Xanatos Speed Chess: Light has to adapt quickly to the appearance of Naomi Misora, because with her around his Memory Gambit might blow up in his face. The entire second half of Silent Partner is characters quickly adapting and devising contingencies and fail-safes as their plans smash headlong into each other.
• You Are Not Alone: Naomi and Misa getting close to each other at their mutual low points in the beginning of the story had this effect for Naomi in the first place, and eventually for both of them. As explicitly recounted by Matsuda in his speech at their wedding in the sequel.
• Your Costume Needs Work: Misa references this trope when describing how, being on the run, she acts like she is obviously not the wanted celebrity Amane Misa. It worked almost perfectly. In the only case when it didn't, it turned out to be to her advantage.

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