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“Look Danchiku!” Kaburagi exclaimed, jabbing excitedly at his phone screen. “There’s a Mawile raid out here! I haven’t seen one of those since they put the new update out!”
Danchiku bent over his friend’s shoulder to see what icon he was pointing out, and then turned to his own Pokemon Go game. Sure enough, the dark grey silhouette of the Pokemon flashed up on his “Nearby Raids” radar, too.
Kaburagi grabbed his arm. “We’ve only got 20 more minutes Danchiku, we gotta go! With the two of us it’ll be easy to get this one!”
Danchiku nodded. It was starting to get dark, but the raid didn’t look to be that far away in their neighborhood. Let’s go, Issa!
They headed down the street, following the map on their phones.
Kaburagi glanced up from his screen to an alley between houses. “We’re gonna miss it if we don’t hurry - This’ll be a shortcut.”
Danchiku frowned dubiously at him. Was this really a street? It was drawn like one on their map. And it did seem to cut past some of the apartment buildings they’d otherwise need to go around. “Okay, Issa.”
He followed Kaburagi and they picked their way down the alley past some trash cans and around a length of chainlink fence.
“There it is!” Kaburagi pointed, as if the gym on the phone screen existed in the physical space in front of them, instead of just on the maps in their phone. “Okay I’m starting the raid, rattata-squirtle-jigglypuff, kay?”
Danchiku nodded, tapping the gym and joining the room. They both quickly assembled their Pokemon teams, waiting for the timer to start the raid to click down to zero. Kaburagi stared rapt at his screen watching the timer to start the raid change colors and click down to zero, and Danchiku shifted from foot to foot, glancing around at their surroundings. They were at the end of the alley tucked behind what Danchiku thought was probably the apartment complex the gym was named for, with the building to one side, a dumpster to the other, and a fence ahead of them. A streetlight flickered on behind them, casting their long shadows across the alley.
The Pokemon battle came to life on both their screens, the larger than life Mawile appearing before them.
“Let’s get him, Danchiku!” Kaburagi exclaimed, tapping rapidly at his screen to load up and unleash his Charizard’s charged attack. Danchiku furrowed his eyebrows, tapping equally rapidly on his Camerupt. It took them a couple Pokemon each to whittle down the Mawile’s health, but before long, its health bar dwindled to zero and it shrunk to its normal size.
“Awright! Friendship bonus!” Kaburagi cheered, flinging Premiere Balls rapidly at the Mawile.
Danchiku grinned at the extra Premiere Balls added to their Raid rewards. He carefully held each ball in place until the target circle around the Mawile shrunk, then released it to make sure his aim went true.
“Got ‘im!” Kaburagi cheered. “How about you Danchiku?” Danchiku nodded. “Awright, way to go team!”
He turned to leave only to find himself squinting directly into a beam of light. “What the?”
Danchiku put his hand up like a visor over his brows.
A tall, broad-shouldered man had turned down the alley and was shining his flashlight around corners. He stopped when he caught them in its beam.
Kaburagi and Danchiku both instantly froze in place, phones held out in front of them reflecting the flashlight’s light. As the man got closer, Danchiku could see he was wearing a tucked in shirt with some kind of security logo on it, and had what looked like a large walkie-talkie on his belt.
“What’re you kids doing back here?” the man called out as he approached. “You’re on private property!”
Kaburagi looked furtively over his shoulder at the fence behind them as if he was really going to consider climbing it.
Don’t do it Issa, Danchiku thought frantically at him. Luckily the fence seemed tall enough to have Kaburagi deterred.
At that point Danchiku noticed the security camera attached to the apartment building pointed directly at them, which must have signaled the guard’s appearance.
“Um,” Kaburagi offered, “Playing Pokemon Go?”
The security guard’s eyes narrowed and Danchiku winced.
“You kids need to get on home,” the security guard lectured. “Find somewhere else to play, not in people’s back doors!”
“Yessir!” Kaburagi yelped, grabbing Danchiku’s arm as they scuttled away.