Sorry for the delay on getting out the next chapter. For some reason, really stressed about how to proceed from here, and I couldn't think for a bit so I put it down and came back. All better now.

Ready? Here we go!

Penny let herself into Gumball's house and heard the now familiar CRACK! as Carrie teleported into the designated spot they had set up on the roof. Penny was riding high on the success of the past week. She had finally been able to relax and get comfortable in Gumball's presence. She was very unhappy with the way things had been going before.

Losing her shell had been a boon, and she had finally had a breakthrough with Gumball during that first episode with her true nature, but the whole shape-shifter thing was hard to deal with. At first, her form had fluctuated with the smallest change in her emotions. After a while, though, she got a handle on it… that is, whenever Gumball wasn't around.

Penny sighed. Before now, her emotions had gone haywire and her shape shifting got a mind of its own whenever they had hung out. Puberty hadn't helped either. Her basic form hadn't altered much but the forms she took on as her mind entered territory beyond kissing Gumball were, at best, mortifying.

As a result, for the past few months, Penny had avoided contact with Gumball for fear he would receive an embarrassingly graphic representation of her mental shift. Thankfully the past month had shown an improvement, but her avoidance had driven her and Gumball apart and she had been at a loss to repair the damage.

So, Penny was fairly optimistic as she prepped breakfast for the boy… cat, she loved when Carrie came downstairs without Gumball and a devastated look on her face. "Carrie, what's wrong? You're so pale!" she giggled at her joke but her laughter died as she registered the - what did she say? Oh- spiritborn's expression. "Carrie, is Gumball alright?" Penny's fear crept into her voice and seemed to reach Carrie.

"Oh he's FINE" She answered acidly. "He seems to have had a wonderful evening in the arms of some floozy cat girl!" Carrie's anger was plain, and under normal circumstances that might have registered with a girl as smart a Penny, but for the moment, her mind was on other things.

Penny immediately slipped into a ferocious she-wolf and bolted towards the stairs. She burst into Gumball's room and stopped suddenly grey and small at the scene in front of her.

Gumball was nose-to-nose with a beautiful pink cat. The two were grasping each other tightly in an impossible knot of limbs. There were clothes all over the floor and the pink cat was even wearing some of Gumball's cloths. Still staring at the scene, Carrie came up behind Penny.

"I cannot believe he did this. Who is she?!" Carries rage was palpable. As Penny stared, at her, it dawned on her. Carrie was in love with him, too. Earlier, she might have hated her, but just then, she was strangely happy to have someone who understood how she felt just now. And she was suddenly the furious she-wolf again.

"I don't know, but I am about to find out!" with a quick movement, she yanked the blanket from the sleeping forms and started calling…

"Gumball!"

Gumball became aware of his body first, tied in a familiar, comforting knot with another body. Another body? He wondered for a second before recalling the night before. Lexy and I must have ended up in the same bed again… Then who is calling me? He thought as he plodded towards full consciousness.

"Gumball!"

He opened his eyes to find two very angry looking girls glaring at him. Well one angry girl and one glowering monstrous she-wolf he recognized as Penny in one of her angry forms. His mind shot the last couple of notches past conscious and he immediately registered his position as it would appear to the two girls. And then he groaned. Later he wondered if he might have avoided what happened next if Lexy hadn't woken up just then.

First Lexy smiled, hugged him and snuggled closer. Then her eyes shot open again and she shoved him back until he went off the bed. His new instincts kicked in, and, with an impossible midair twist, he landed firmly on his injured paws. The pain filled his eyes with tears and a feral roar burst from him before he crumpled into a pain wracked mess on the floor. The roar combined with his sudden collapse jolted the girls into action and the room exploded in motion. Later he had to piece together their stories to build a picture of what had happened.

Lexy dove for the closet and grabbed a tennis racket she'd seen the night before. She turned in time to see a monstrous wolf dragging her newly regained brother from the room with an evil looking ghost following them. She dialed 911. "Yes, please come to the Watterson residence! There is a huge wild animal carrying off my brother." Lexy snapped her phone shut and followed her brother. She figured it best not to mention she'd seen a ghost.

Carrie closed the door just as Lexy began to follow and held it so that Penny and Gumball could escape. She struggled to hold it while Penny dragged the pain dazed Gumball to "safety".

Downstairs, Penny got Gumball into a chair. After making sure he wouldn't fall over, she turned and faced the bottom of the stairs, a growl building in her throat. A groan from Gumball called her attention and she rushed over. "Are you alright? How did she hurt you?" Gumball only groaned in pain. A little frantic, Penny began searching his body for any new injuries. She was looking so hard she never heard the door open or the heavy footsteps of Sheriff Doughnut.

Gumball came around just in time to see Sheriff Doughnut tase Penny. Pushing aside the haze of pain, he yelled. "Sheriff, stop! She's my friend!" The pastry hastily pulled the device off Penny, looking apologetic.

Turning to Gumball, he asked," So, where is the dan-" He never got to finish. With a few bumps and a loud crash, Lexy and Carrie landed at the bottom of the stairs. Sheriff Doughnut turned and stared at the girls tussling on the floor. Getting up first, Lexy swung futilely at Carrie. Her fist passed harmlessly through the ghost girl and sent Lexy lurching forward. Waiting until just the right moment, Carrie grabbed her arm and swung her across the room towards a bookcase.

Lexy crashed into the bookcase and was buried under a pile of debris. Lexy burst out of the pile in fury. A movement to Gumball's left drew his attention and he turned to see the sheriff drawing his weapon while looking at Lexy. Time contracted for Gumball as he filled with rage. He had one dispassionate thought before he was consumed. I wonder if this is how Mom feels when she gets angry.

Penny awoke to a bloodcurdling sound. Once, when she was young, she had seen a show that had featured a tiger. Sadly the tamer was cruel and had pushed the poor animal too far that day. The sound the huge cat had made when it had turned on its master was one that she could never forget. Now she stared, transfixed as the sound that haunted her nightmares emanated from the boy she liked.

Gumball was towering above her and glaring murderously across the room. She blinked. Wait, what happened to him? It looked like him, but his fur had black stripes visible against the blue and his eyes burned gold instead of their usual green. Following his gaze, she felt a hard knot of fear settle in the pit of her stomach. The sheriff was going to shoot that cat-girl, and Gumball obviously cared very deeply for her. The seed of fear in her stomach bloomed into jealousy – he loved that girl.

After all, he didn't act this way when the fat doughnut tasered me, she thought glumly. A sudden thought had her elated that the girl was going to be eliminated. This was perfect. The girl would be out of the picture and she didn't have to do a thing. She leaned forward with a look of grim expectation and she became aware of warmth behind her. Looking back to Gumball, heat struck her in the face like she'd opened a furnace.

Gumball was radiating so much heat, the air around him shimmered and steam rose in tendrils from his body. His growl swelled in intensity until it became a physical sensation. It vibrated through her and sent shivers down her spine. Any thoughts of harming that girl went flat out of her head and the jealousy she'd felt was replaced by awe. What she saw terrified her, even as it mesmerized her.

He is magnificent. Her thoughts rang in her head. Her mind recalled the tiger in full ferocity. He was beautiful, but perfectly deadly. To behold, he was at once alluring and terrifying. A familiar deadly click jerked her attention away from the creature in front of her. She turned back towards the sheriff and was filled with terror anew. The growl coming from Gumball had silenced the room and ended the conflict between the cat-girl and Carrie, but it had given the sheriff a new, more dangerous, target.

With the threat removed from the cat-girl, Gumball became silent, but he still stared furiously at the gun in Sheriff's hand. Suddenly another growl issued from across the room. Crouching down, preparing to pounce was the pink cat. She had undergone a similar transformation but the contrast between her pink fur and blood red stripes was stark compared to Gumball's blue and black. The growl she was emitting was that same thrumming promise of death that had issued from Gumball.

Penny watched, frozen, as a sort of stalemate ensued. The sheriff was in the middle swinging his gun between the two. When the gun was pointed at one the other growled. Penny was at a loss. Somehow she knew this wasn't going to last; one of them would break soon. As she stared hopelessly at the terrified sheriff, she realized it would probably be him.

Then it hit her. Watching him she caught a tiny moment of silence as he swung the weapon between the two. Whispering so that she wouldn't scared him, Penny got the sheriff's attention. "I think if you put the gun down, they will stop."

"N-n no way! If I don't – keep this up – the one behind me – will pounce." the sheriff spoke haltingly between movements.

Signaling to Carrie, Penny nodded meaningfully to the sheriff and Carrie nodded and drifted ever so slowly toward the sheriff's back. After a moment, Penny said, "Then how about pointing the gun in the middle? If one gets ready to pounce, you can still move to get them." Come on, Carrie! The sheriff thought a moment, gun still dancing between the two cats.

Alright," he said suddenly. "I'll do it." He was too early though and Carrie couldn't catch him when the two cats suddenly rushed him, blurs of pink and blue.

BANG!

Carrie saw the cats move and rushed forward to catch the sheriff but she was too slow. The officer was suddenly sandwiched between the cats and the gun went off. Carrie was filled with horror. She slowly came forward, scared to see what happened but driven helplessly by her need to ensure Gumball was safe. Suddenly, a strange voice filled the air.

"JUST WHAT DO YOU THINK YOUR DOING TO MY # ^%ER?!" Carrie blinked. That last word was garbled and she couldn't understand it. She finally came around to the front and was relieved to see that the gun hadn't had the chance to move. It was pinned between the outstretched hands of the two cats.

Slowly, their hands removed the gun from the sheriff's grasp. Working as though a single pair of hands, they unloaded the weapon before bending the barrel to aim back at the shooter. In sync, they opened their moths to speak and the origin of the strange voice became clear as they spoke in unison, their voices blending to create a new voice.

"HOW DARE YOU POINT THAT GUN AT MY FAMILY?" Revelation sparked in Carrie's mind. No wonder the pink cat looks so familiar – they must be twins! Why didn't Gumball ever mention her? Carrie resolved to ask after this was over. Speaking of which, she thought, returning her attention to the spectacle in front of her.

The two steaming cats each used one hand to lift the doughnut in the air. They brought his face down within inches of their own and each fixed one burning golden eye on each of the poor doughnut's blue ones. "If you ever try to hurt my # ^%er again, I will look for you, I will find you and I will destroy you." They would have whispered if they weren't speaking in unison, Carrie thought. This time, she correctly deciphered the garbled word as brother/sister being spoken in unison.

Finally they dropped the shaken officer and slumped down as they passed out. Carrie managed to catch the twins while the sheriff crawled out of the house, jabbering in fear. She shuddered a bit, recalling how she'd seen their mother cause a similar reaction in a security guard at the mall and hoped she never ended up on the receiving end of that little trick.

In her relief, an impulse took her and she kissed Gumball's forehead. As she did she noticed some black on the roots some of his fur. She stood back and looked and she could see it. Just barely visible, slightly darker stripes marred the once pure color of both cats' fur. That was okay with her though. I don't mind a little darkness, she thought. Especially considering how he'd looked a moment ago, she mused and fondly stroked the fur behind his ears.

She'd never seen anything so incredible. She was a little afraid, though. Even though she had gone intangible, she had been struck by a wave of energy that had burst from the two cats as they had transformed. As she eased the two cats down onto the couch, she had a sudden thought. She tried phasing through Gumball with one hand. She recoiled when her hand encountered a wall of energy and she was faced with alarming information.

She couldn't phase through! She didn't know how she felt about that. Carrie had always been able to avoid getting hurt by phasing out. The idea that this boy could bypass that was kind of thrilling. If he could touch her even if she didn't want to be touched... The thoughts that this information roused in her were vivid and alarming. As she struggled with her emotions concerning this new aspect of Gumball, a prickling on her neck caused her to look around.

Penny was staring at her. Carrie's mind zipped through everything she'd just done. Had she seen the kiss? Trying to phase through? Her mind raced a moment. She latched onto the sensation of heat she'd gotten during Gumball and his twin's transformation. "They are still kind of hot. I tried to see if he was hurt and got scorched."

Penny's nodded slowly, "I know. It was like I was sitting next to a furnace earlier." Carrie relaxed. The other girl wouldn't have left it alone if she'd seen the more embarrassing bits. Carrie mentally cringed from the idea of Penny finding out about her crush on Gumball. She didn't want to betray her friend, but she couldn't simply give up on Gumball. If she did she knew she would regret it if she didn't give it her all.

On the other hand, she kind of wished Penny had seen. At least then she could be honest about her feelings to someone. Maybe they could try for Gumball's affection as equals. Then again, Gumball had been in love with Penny forever, while Carrie was only his gal-pal. Maybe I should give up, she thought.

Penny suddenly stood up. "I think we had best start cleaning up. If Mrs. Watterson sees this mess we will be on the receiving end of the glare these two gave the sheriff. Gumball told me that she did that once to Mr. Wilson."

"I remember that... I'll take care of the bookshelf."

She turned back to the two cats and Penny and started to clean up the mess they had made. They didn't need to be on the receiving end of what the twins had given to the sheriff from Nicole. But she couldn't help but feel eyes watching her. She kept looking but no one was there.

Lexy was sitting cross legged on the bunk bed, staring at her fur. The red stripes had gone away after a while. After everything, she was a little embarrassed that she'd displayed such a side of herself to complete strangers. Gumball was sleeping and the girls were hanging out in his room in case he needed anything. Penny and Carrie seemed to be handling all this very well.

In fact they were doing almost too well. After putting her and Gumball in separate beds, they had cleaned the room and living room. After she had woke they had listened to her story and seemed to have taken her at her word on that. But there was the matter of the transformation that she had seen Gumball undergo before experiencing herself. After a half hour of watching them hang out waiting to help Gumball, she could take it anymore.

"How come you guys are so calm? Gumball and I are obviously not normal and I am so freaked out right now about what happened."

Lexy watched as the ghost and whatever Penny was, exchanged looks. Carrie sighed and said, "I guess you could tell by now that we aren't exactly normal either. I am a spiritborn – a kind of living ghost I guess? Gumball and his brother Darwin are, like, the only guys I trust here. They helped me through a rough – uh – growth spurt. Afterwards they didn't judge me and I can be myself with them. Penny is a shape-shifter. Most of her family wear a special shell to keep their shifting under control. But, a couple of years ago, Gumball helped her leave her shell and be herself. She opened herself to his possible ridicule only to find he had none. I guess you could say we both owe him. Also, to be honest, this is not too far outside normal for a day with Gumball."

"Oh… wow. Sounds like my brother can be a handful. Care to share?" Lexy sat back as the other girls spun various tales about this alien blue twin of hers. His purported antics soon had her laughing to the point of tears. "Gumball sounds like an interesting guy! You won't believe what he did when we met last night."

The girls had tears shimmering in their eyes after hearing about Gumball's stash of presents. "He really is amazing," Penny gushed.

"You bet he is. Best guy I know!" Carrie agreed.

Lexy cocked her head to the side, a question suddenly occurring to her. "Are either of you interested in him?"

That seems like a good spot to make you all mad at me and rabid for the next chapter. Won't take as long this time it's already almost done.

P.S. The mixed POV after Lexy wakes up is not a POV error; it is each girl's POV expressed through the lens of Gumball's understanding of the story. The shared information is what gives him some limited insight into their thoughts. So, in conclusion, no I did not violate my POV scheme.