Father and Son

"Your child is Kira, so you'll kill him and kill yourself?!"

- Misa Amane

Father and Son (親子, Oyako, lit. "Parent and child") is the thirty-sixth chapter of the Death Note manga series.

Plot
With Rem looking on, another human is using her Death Note to kill criminals. He then reminds Rem of the deal that they have made: he kills the criminals who feature in the news reports but can also use it for his own purposes.

Fifty days has passed and Soichiro Yagami is still confined to his cell, refusing to be released from confinement until his son is exonerated. Light denies being Kira and begs L to let him go. He has still not been told that the Kira killings have resumed. Misa Amane still believes that she is being held by a stalker and begs him to let her see Light, her obsession for him intriguing L.

Worried for the health of the prisoners, Aizawa urges L to face the facts and release them. He even thinks that L is confining Light because he just cannot admit that he was wrong.

It was established early in the investigation that Kira could only kill a person whose name and face he knew. That is how he managed to kill Lind L. Tailor, who died when his face and name was made public, but has never been able to kill L who has always used false names. How could Light be Kira when, confined to his cell, he has been unable to access any information whatsoever, least of all the names and faces of criminals recently killed by Kira?

Aizawa further points out that if Kira could kill just by mentally focusing on someone then he would never be found out even while under surveillance. If that was the case, then why kill Tailor, Raye Penber and 11 other FBI agents who were trying to track him down and expose him?

The Kira Task Force has searched Light's home and only found a diary in which he kept notes on the case, even wondering if he himself was Kira. Aizawa urges L to stop wasting time and get on with finding the real Kira who is now operating again. L agrees but only after he has spoken personally with Soichiro.

Three days later, Light and Misa are put in handcuffs and placed in the back of a car that is being driven by Soichiro. Light asks his father if they’re being released, but he answers that they are being put to death. L has concluded that they are Kiras and it has been decided in high places that they should be executed without trial.

Light strenuously denies being Kira and is amazed that his father believes L over him, his own son. Soichiro reminds him that L is a powerful figure with a lot of influence over the police, for the simple reason that he has never been wrong before. He has even offered to commit suicide if the Kira killings continue after Light and Misa's execution.

Light cannot understand this kind of reasoning, especially since L has always solved his cases with hard evidence against the perpetrators, which is hardly the situation at the moment.

Soichiro stops the car in a deserted spot and announces that he is going to kill his son and then himself. Misa will be executed when she is found later. Misa and Light beg him to reconsider, but, in spite of their pleas, he pulls out a gun and fires at Light.

However, the bullet was a blank. Overcome with relief, Soichiro addresses L, who has been watching from a miniature camera hidden in the car. The whole thing was a bluff, L assuming that if either Light or Misa were Kira then Soichiro would have been killed with Kira's power before he had the chance to kill Light. L would not put it past Kira to kill even his own father — though he also assumes that Light would have seen through the ruse long before his father shot at him.

L announces that they can now be taken out of custody, but there are conditions. The evidence that links Misa to the Kira tapes still has to be explained. She can resume her public life but will be permanently escorted by a police officer.

As for Light, he is to join the investigation full-time. He readily agrees with L: they will capture Kira together.

Conception
The chapter title refers to Soichiro and Light. Ohba said that he had trouble creating some of the chapter names for a lot of chapters and so he retrospectively wondered if "perhaps" he did not put enough thought into the chapter names.

Chapter Guide
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