The Puppeteer

Winchester, London

[Warning: Major. Character. Death.] [I'm so sorry]

13th June 2007:

The tension in London had been at an all-time high these days, with Winchester going into utter chaos. It was one of the most steadily growing, developing, and flourishing cities in England, and preserving and maintaining its progress was extremely necessary, however, with the sudden events taking place recently there, no one could be sure anymore.

After a quick word with L, Watari had departed for Wammy's House, to put L's best two candidates for being his successor to a test. "It's a silly little group of bandits that think themselves to be revolutionaries," L had said after reading through the reports describing the situation of the city that had been the home of his childhood, "It'll be a quick warm-up, of sorts, for Near and Mello, a training session, if you may." 

And so Watari, who had nodded and immediately left with all the necessary files, was now sitting in his office with the two possible successors in front of him, his pristine mustache covering the tiny smile that always made its way onto his face when he visited his home.

It was always nice going back to England, back to the Orphanage. It was always nice to see all the kids there, have a chat or two with them, especially Near and Mello, despite just how increasingly difficult they were getting to handle every time he visited.

"This is bullshit!" Mello spat, slamming the file in his hand onto the table, "Why would anyone even want to target a place like Winchester anyway?!"

Why indeed?

"It is safe to assume that whoever is behind this wishes to change the government and bring about a revolution, and to do that, it is necessary for them to threaten the ruining of a city that will undoubtedly prosper in the near future," Watari said, picking up the file and handing it to Mello once more.

"But why plunder and steal over here when you have cities like London? Where all the political attention lies? It strategically doesn't make any sense," Mello asked with a raised brow as he looked through the file in his hands, nibbling at a chocolate bar thoughtfully. He couldn't understand why anyone would attack a place like Winchester, it just didn't sit right with him no matter how much he tried to come up with a theory. However, the other successor had a different opinion.

"If you would bother to look carefully enough," Near started, fidgeting silently with an Optimus Prime action figure while his mind ran faster than a bullet train, "You would notice that whoever our thief is, thinks himself to be a savior of the poor and punisher of the rich. The property prices in Winchester have been steadily increasing for almost fifteen years now, and are sure to sky-rocket shortly. Targetting this city is a two birds one stone threat from the robber's side. It's a warning directed at the economy that demands immediate attention, and a message to the public and the government that says any city that favors the rich will be destroyed."

But Mello was not convinced. Not because they were rivals, Mello would not let his rivalry come in between him and a case, it was just something odd about the whole crime that made him feel like there was more to it than what met the eye, like there were ulterior motives of maybe a group of people behind this. So he stayed silent, trying to search his mind for the source of his uneasiness, tuning out as Near continued to speak.

"These thefts have all been bank robberies. No clues to follow, no patterns to pick out, just a seemingly random set of bank robberies. Where the pattern can be found, however, is in the distractions caused before the robberies."

Sitting up, Near gained Mello's attention when he placed down the action figure to his side before looking at the map spread out on the table in front of him, his chin resting over his propped up knee as he pointed out the locations, "The first robbery was right here, NatWest Bank, but the distraction - blast at Winchester Discovery Center. The second robbery targeted every ATM of the HSBC bank while the distraction was The Minister Gallery [It's an art gallery]. Next was Barclay's Bank when the Patsy Cline Historic House was blown up."