Connecting the Dots

Step by step, the policeman walked towards the boy.  The boy's eyes were wide, his lips pressed together until they were white.  For once, he didn't have anything to say.

"Impressive.  Truly impressive." the policeman said, with a smile.  "Or, should I say truly /abysmal/ that no one else caught on to you until now."

"You visit a shop.  A man is murdered, your group's detective denounces the 'culprit', and your police friends haul him off."

"You visit a hotel.  A woman is murdered, you throw a 'culprit' in jail."

"You go to a karaoke bar, a man is murdered, you throw a 'culprit' in jail."

"Baseball game, murder, 'culprit'.  Hot springs, murder, 'culprit'.  Pizza, cake, flowers, gameshow, /the blood pours into the floorboards/."

"I don't know who you people are, who started the whole thing.  Right now, my coworkers are saying the same thing to each of your group, individually."

"I don't know how you operate, whether you just frame people or hypnotise them somehow or just bribe or threaten them to take the fall for you.  I don't know, and I don't care."

"There's a story, by Agatha Christie, about a man who manipulates people into killing each other.  Where he goes, people die.  No court could have convicted him, but once a good man saw what he was doing he never got to do it again."

"I have high hopes for a long career in front of me, so I'm really happy I don't have to do that.  I don't know what tools you use, but maybe you have some way of killing me and getting past the people guarding the doors.  Maybe, but maybe I think you don't want to do that.  Maybe I think you want to come back with me, you and all the rest in your group, and come back to a nice, /safe/ prison cell where you can tell us all about what you've been doing."

"Because, you see, it's already too late.  Right now, every major news channel, plus the Internet, is telling the entire public about your entire history that I've pieced together.  Your detective isn't 'the incredible solver of ingenious crimes' any more.  Your police friends aren't 'the officers with the great records' any more.  Right now, everyone in the country knows as I well as I do that you've always arrived at your crime scenes BEFORE your murders."

"I'm really sorry, actually, if there are people in your group who honestly have no idea what you're doing, who just like following you around or are being used by you.  For all I know, you're one of them, a completely clueless patsy.  I'm sorry if so, but I'm not going to risk letting a core planner go by holding back a name."

"Every single one of you is known.  Every single data point, every life lost where you've trod, is known.  The people don't like serial killers, little boy.  Right now, they're angry, because they can connect the dots."

"So, what do you say?  Come, you're underage, I won't even arrest you at first.  We'll call it 'police protection'.  Whether to come with me, or run, you need to make a choice.  Either way...  you'll never 'solve' a murder again."

"No matter how long you managed to pull the wool over our eyes, there's only ever one truth."