Disclaimer: I do not own Pokémon or any of the characters that are included in the story.

This story includes and references events that took place in Pokémon: Omega Ruby and Pokémon: Alpha Sapphire. It does not, however, attempt to tell a story that took place the aforementioned titles.

Stronger, Chapter 4:

Wally was in a pool, floating around lazily on an inflatable ring. It was a public pool, where seemingly nobody but himself, Ralts, and the lifeguard were.

He stepped out of the pool to dry off, and the lifeguard immediately started blowing her whistle. "What did I do now?" Wally thought as he went to go see what the lifeguard had to say.

But the lifeguard was not blowing her whistle at him. When Wally looked to see what the lifeguard was staring so intently at, he saw himself in the water, clearly unable to swim. When Wally looked back at the lifeguard, she, who was now May, had jumped into the water to save the drowning copy of himself.

He blinked, and he was suddenly in May-lifeguard's arms, being carried out of the water. "I-I can breathe, d-don't worry!" Wally said as May started to attempt to perform CPR on him. As she lowered her face closer and closer to his, Wally faced away, covered his mouth, and shut his eyes tightly.

He felt a strong hand grip his wrist tightly, picking him all the way off of the ground. When he opened his eyes, he was not at a pool, and it was not May. It was the man in the blue outfit, who had a sinister look in his eyes. Wally grabbed for his pokéball with his free hand, but it was nowhere to be found. Suddenly, he felt as though he couldn't breathe. The man in blue had wrapped his free hand around Wally's small neck, strangling him. "R-Ralts, where are you?..." he thought. In the corner of his eye, though, he saw his Ralts as well as the man with a lab coat passed out on the floor of the forest. "May, someone… please…"

Wally inhaled sharply, followed by a coughing fit, which he tried to make quieter. May and Grovyle were undisturbed, as they were both in deep sleep. Ralts, however, got up to comfort Wally. The horrendous nightmare that he was having was loud enough for the psychic pokémon to be awoken, not from actual noise, but from the noise inside of his head.

Wally sat up for a moment to try his best to clear his mind. He threw off his covers, as they were too thick and heavy for his frail body to support all night, and they were likely the cause of the choking feeling he had. Ralts was trying its best to still comfort him, but it was still very tired and fell asleep on his lap. "I guess it's bedtime again…" he thought as he drifted back to sleep.

Wally was granted the gift of having a dreamless sleep after the one nightmare. May, on the other hand, had two that she could remember. The first dream she had was, to put simply, about trampolines.

She was in a store that was laid out like a mattress store, but instead of mattresses, there were hundreds of trampolines. She was jumping from trampoline to trampoline, but missed a jump. As she was about to land with painfully on the metal rim of the trampoline, she woke up with a jolt. She looked over to make sure that her jolt didn't awaken Grovyle. She then looked to Wally and saw that his covers were off of him, exposing his bare chest.

"He didn't tell me he slept shirtless…" she thought as she drifted back to sleep.

She had yet another odd dream. This time, she was walking to Petalburg City Gym, with Wally, to see her father. Upon arriving to the gym, Wally confidently asked to battle her father.

Instead of laughing at him, May's father accepted the challenge and threw out a Vigoroth. Wally unbuttoned his collared shirt and threw out his Ralts, who was clearly underleveled for the battle. Somehow, though, Ralts defeated the Vigoroth, and began to evolve (May didn't yet know what Ralts evolved into so in her dream it just grew in size). Wally was awarded the gym badge then and there.

Wally was ecstatic, jumping around, but as soon as May came over to congratulate him, he turned more serious and mature. He grabbed May's hands and stared her deeply in the eyes. "Thank you, May. I wouldn't have come this far without your help." Dream-Wally said. May could not help but blush at this.

May was taken completely aback. She knew Wally to be absolutely adorable and boyish, but in this dream, he was more upright, more mature, and even handsome. Dream Wally didn't lean in for a kiss, but when May had woken up, she was blushing very deeply. For a second, May tried to interpret the dream, and suddenly felt like she was being selfish. "Am I helping Wally to make him the perfect boyfriend or something?" She shook her head, dismissed the thought, and laid back down.

"I don't know him well enough to decide whether I wanna date him. I wanna help him get stronger, that's all. He just happens to be cute…" she thought to reassure herself.

Neither of them had set an alarm, but Wally did have a bizarre internal clock. He woke up around 7:00 AM, feeling refreshed and ready to continue his adventure. He tried to wake May up, but both May and Grovyle grumpily shooed him away.

"Then I'll train by myself until you wake up!" Wally thought. He wrote a note, explaining that he had his inhaler on him and that he'd not go past Petalburg Woods.

Wally and Ralts headed out to Route 104, where there were now a few trainers. He nervously challenged each of them, defeating them somewhat easily. He realized that he should progress into the woods to train against stronger trainers and pokémon.

May woke up fully about an hour later and looked at Wally's note. She was relieved that he took a safety precaution, but she was still worried, so she put her shoes on quickly and headed out after him, closing up the secret base so that other trainers could make use of it.

By the time she had caught up to Wally, he was easily defeating a bug-catcher. She snuck up behind him as he finished congratulating the trainer and wishing him luck, and poked him on the neck to startle him. Of course, he jumped and screamed. He covered his mouth and blushed, when realizing that he screamed in front of May. "Heya Wally! I can see you've been busy getting stronger!" May pointed out.

Wally felt touched by the choice of words. "T-thank you!" he said louder than he meant to.

May rubbed her chin. "So we could easily make it out of this forest, and get to the next city, but I think we should battle every trainer we can find first!" May pointed out.

"G-good point, I'll keep looking for them!" Wally said, obliviously.

May frowned a little, as she was subtly hinting that they should battle, but she decided that she really should look for other trainers to train against first, since she knew that Ralts was a force to be reckoned with by now. She walked around the forest, defeating any pokémon that she encountered, until she encountered one that caught her attention. She hadn't seen this one before, so it must've been rare.

She pulled out her Pokédex to examine it, and learned that it was a Slakoth, which evolved into Vigoroth, one of the pokémon her father uses. With relative ease, May managed to catch the Slakoth. "Strength comes in numbers…" she thought as she examined the pokéball.

Now she had two pokémon. She was given the Exp. Share previously, so training it would not likely be a problem. She set off to look for trainers and strengthen her Slakoth.

After a few trainers and many wild pokémon were defeated, she was feeling pretty confident with her team's ability to battle. Her Slakoth had learned 'Feint Attack' by the end of the training session. Because her Grovyle was already quite powerful, May did not feel the need to train it much at all.

She set off to look for Wally, whose Ralts was effortlessly defeating a Cascoon. Before she made her presence known, she examined him. Wally was standing more confidently and shouting commands easily. He scarcely stuttered when he was training alone.

"I guess it's just social anxiety." May thought. "Heya, Wally!" May shouted, making him jump again, at which she giggled.

"Y-you gotta st-stop scaring me like that!" Wally said, exasperated. "H-hey, Ralts just l-learned 'Magical Leaf!'"

May raised her eyebrows. "Wow! I bet it's grown a lot then! I wonder how strong it is!" May said, hinting that she wants to battle.

"V-very! I b-b-bet Ralts c-could even beat y-your Grovyle!" Wally said, struggling. He was evidently not used to taunting people, and May noted how cute it was that he was trying his best to do so.

"Oh? We'll see about that, Wally! Go, Grovyle!" May shouted as she let out her starter. Wally was clearly very nervous, but he tried to steel his nerves as he sent out Ralts.

Both pokémon were very experienced, especially in comparison to the average power the wild pokémon of the forest had. Unfortunately for Wally and Ralts, because Grovyle had evolved from Treecko, it was faster than Ralts. Not that it mattered at first. "Quick Attack, now!" May ordered. The Grovyle vanished and reappeared directly in front of Ralts, before Ralts could attack.

"Dodge it, Ralts!" Wally ordered, and order which the Ralts was barely able to follow as the 'Quick Attack' hardly missed. "Follow it with a confusion!" he said as Ralts sent a psychic wave to Grovyle, hurting it.

"Grovyle, use Mega Drain!" May said quickly. Grovyle made a vacuum with its mouth, absorbing some health from Ralts to recover itself, causing Wally to get nervous.

"R-Ralts, use Confusion again!" he commanded, and Ralts sent the psychic wave again towards it.

"Use Quick Attack before Ralts can attack again!" May commanded. But as Grovyle went to attack Ralts, it stumbled and fell flat on its face.

"Yes, it's confused!" Wally thought. "We can finish this, hurry up and use one more Confusion!"

Ralts did so and ended up knocking Grovyle out. Wally was jumping with joy, hugging his exhausted Ralts.

"It's a little too early to celebrate, Wally!" May said, and Wally tilted his head in confusion. "B-but I-" Wally was cut off by May as she sent out her Slakoth. Wally was suddenly very nervous. He didn't think his Ralts could handle much more; if even the initial Quick Attack from Grovyle had landed, Ralts likely would have fainted by now.

"What's wrong, Wally? Let's fight!" May said, taunting him a little this time.

Wally again steeled himself and set Ralts down. "F-fine! Ralts, quick, use Disarming Voice!"

"Slakoth, dodge it!" May ordered. The Slakoth, though usually very slow, dashed to avoid being hit. Unfortunately, the Slakoth could not dodge it, as the move cannot be dodged by anything. May grinded her teeth a little and ordered "Retaliate with a Feint Attack!"

"Ralts, quick, don't let it hit you!" Wally begged. Unfortunately, like 'Disarming Voice,' 'Feint Attack' cannot be dodged. The Ralts dashed from side to side, but the Slakoth appeared from behind it in the shadows to deal the coup de grâce. With one slash, Ralts toppled over and fainted. Wally picked it up, and fought off tears. "C-c-congratul-lations…" he said to May. He was not mad at her at all, he was just frustrated that he lost.

"Hey, Wally." May said to get his attention, as he had just turned around to go to the Pokémon Center. "You did amazing, you really have gotten stronger!" She said.

Wally did not turn around, for tears were now streaming down his face. He was no longer sad or frustrated, he was happy because he realized that he truly was becoming stronger. Even after being out for so long, his body was only now becoming fatigued. He nodded in thanks, as he didn't want May to know he was crying, and he walked off toward the Pokémon Center.

May let him go. She could tell that he was crying and needed to be alone for a bit. She followed soon after though, because Wally's Ralts had dealt a devastating blow to both of her pokémon. By the time she arrived, Wally was just walking out of the bathroom. "H-hey! Sorry if y-you were waiting on me!"

"It's fine, I have to heal my pokémon too, and I didn't feel like waiting until we got to Rustboro!" May explained, and Wally nodded in acknowledgement. May dropped off her pokémon and used the bathroom herself.

After her pokémon were healed, the two traveled back to Route 104, then Petalburg Woods, then back onto Route 104 again. They both easily defeated all the trainers they encountered. Together, they effortlessly made it to Rustboro City.

Though neither of them were mind readers, and it wasn't discussed beforehand, they both knew what came next- the Gym Leader.