A/N—many of the OCs in this work are characters from my original work. Using them in a fanfiction or work of any form without specific permission from the author is prohibited. Thank you.

The driver of the dusty red pickup truck parked it in the gravel driveway of the farmhouse and climbed out, shooing back the blue heeler cattle dog that ran barking to greet him as he shut the truck door. The carton of menthol cigarettes in hand, he started walking towards the faded white farmhouse, the setting sun's rays glinting in his dusty blonde hair.

Opening the screen door that led from the front porch into the living room, he called out, "Mama? I brought your cigarettes, ma'am."

An older black woman emerged from another doorway, wiping her hands on a kitchen towel as she did so. She smiled at the man in front of her, wrinkles creasing slightly around her eyes as she did.

"Oh, Philip," she said, chuckling. "You really are a good boy, aren't you?" She reached out to take the carton of cigarettes from his hand, pulling him down to kiss his cheek as she did so. "Thank you, baby…" She let out a cackle of laughter as a blush suffused Philip's face, turning the normally tanned features bright red—even to the tips of his ears.

"It's just PJ, Mama," he told her, still blushing. "Nobody ever calls me Philip unless I'm in trouble."

Mama Gee was still chuckling to herself as she began to turn back towards the doorway she had just come through a moment earlier. "Philip, the only trouble you could have been in now would be if you had missed dinner when it came out of the oven. That chicken pot pie doesn't need to be getting cold."

Where your dog at? He staying out of trouble, too?"

"Yes ma'am," PJ said, following Mama Gee down the hallway. "Ranger's been good. He knows to stay out of the barn and away from your garden." PJ's boots made dull thuds of sound on the old floorboards as they entered the kitchen at the back of the house.

The kitchen seemed normal enough, with white cabinets and worn Formica counters lining the walls. A large wooden table stood in the middle of the room, its surface covered in small dings, scratches, stains, and water rings. An equally worn looking rolling sheet sat on the table, covered with a dusting of flour and a large lump of pale dough. A small bowl holding more flour sat nearby, a rolling pin lying next to it; while a baking dish filled with peaches and syrup over a crust waited in the middle of the table. A beat-up gas oven and stove sat near one corner of the room, giving off the delicious smell of something savory cooking. Against another wall, an older model refrigerator groaned and hummed quietly to itself. Halfway down the same wall was a large kitchen sink with a rack of wet dishes in it.

Mama Gee walked to the table and set the carton of cigarettes down at one end before taking her place in front of the rolling pin and dough at the other. She reached for the apron that hung over the back of one of the chairs pushed in around the table and then tied it around her ample waist, protecting her old—but clean—yellow-flowered print dress from the flour and dough before picking up the rolling pin and turning her attention to the ball of dough in front of her. Seconds later, the loose flesh of her upper arms was wobbling slightly as she pressed and rolled out the dough into a flattened circle.

If the room itself appeared normal, not all of its inhabitants did…

An older, gray-haired white man in a dress shirt and slacks was drying dishes, his sleeves rolled up to his elbows as he passed over the plates to another man to put away.

The man putting away the plates was younger than PJ—seeming to be in his late 20's or early 30's to PJ's mid-40's—with blonde hair, blue eyes and a smile that alternated between infectiously carefree and serious by turns. None of which were quite as eye-catching as what he was wearing. What looked like a tight white spandex bodysuit was covered with thin, glowing yellow lines—lines that looked strangely like the circuits on a motherboard—and some form of body armor, somewhat like what might be worn for BMX racing. When the man in the bodysuit saw PJ walk into the kitchen, he grinned and hopped up to sit on the countertop, throwing the towel towards PJ.

"Catch," he sang out, watching as PJ's light-green eyes widened in surprise before PJ grabbed the towel out of the air. "Your turn to put up dishes. Or you can dry, I'm sure Alan-1 won't mind trading jobs…"

Mama Gee turned around at that, her eyes narrowing as she looked at the blonde man sitting on the countertop. "CLU! Get off my kitchen counter, right now! You leave black scuff marks all over my cabinet doors when you kick them, swinging your feet like that. And I have to cook using that counter!"

CLU looked sheepish, guiltily halting the swing of his feet before they came into contact with a cabinet again. He climbed off of the countertop, with a murmured 'Yes, ma'am' before stopping and looking back at Mama Gee.

"How do you know I'm the one leaving scuff marks? My boots are white…Rinzler wears black boots. He might be the one leaving scuff marks…"

Mama Gee looked up from the crust that she had been rolling out on the table top.

"That child's not leaving scuff marks," she told him, bluntly. "Rinzler's a cat. Cat don't leave marks behind when it don't want to. YOU," she continued, pointing a finger dusty with flour in CLU's direction, "are a puppy. Puppy still learning how to get around." Having said that, Mama Gee turned her attention back to her crust.

"I'm not a User companion…" CLU complained. "I'm the best hacking program Flynn ever wrote. I know how to get around without leaving traces behind."

"Maybe so, in that computer of yours," Mama Gee said, not bothering to look up as her arms wielded the rolling pin, flattening and spreading out the crust in front of her even more. "Not here. All of you still learning how to get around…here."

She glanced up to catch PJ's pale green eyes with her own. "Philip, be a darling and put those smokes in the freezer for me? Don't want them getting stale…" Mama Gee waited until PJ nodded and moved to pick up the carton of cigarettes before dusting the crust with flour and rolling it out a little further. She reached for the baking pan full of peaches and syrup to pull it closer to her, and then gently placed the crust over the peach filling.

As she began to pinch the edges of the top and bottom crust closed with blunt fingers that were yellowed at the tips from nicotine stains, she asked the older gray-haired man a question. "Where's your godson and his boyfriend?"

"Hmm? Oh, Sam and Tron said that they were going to watch a movie in the den."

"Any idea how long ya'll going to be staying here? Charlene's gonna want her room back. Child won't say it…but teenage girl's not going to want be sharing a bed with her auntie forever. 'Specially seeing as how her auntie is me."

"I'm afraid I really have no idea. I know they said that they would finish all of the stories, if we gave them enough time; however, they never said exactly how much is 'enough time'. I don't think they were expecting us to all end up staying with you, though." He looked thoughtful as he added, "I'm certain that they will have us back in our own stories soon."

"Do you really believe that?" CLU's voice was soft as it came from the corner of the room. He had moved when no one was looking, and now stood with his head down as though the patterns of wood grain in the worn floorboards were the most interesting thing he had ever seen. "It's…it's been a while since they even started a chapter for me, or wrote a possible prompt, or…well, anything. It's like they've forgotten about me…"

Black clad arms wrapped around the slim white form as an odd, growling purr sounded. Rinzler had slipped into the room as quietly as the cat that Mama Gee had accused him of being, and had taken the few steps needed to reach the hacking program. Rinzler pulled CLU closer and held him—CLU's back against Rinzler's chest—the sharp point of his helmet's chin hooked over CLU's shoulder as Rinzler tried comforting him like an older brother would have done to a younger child.

The others in the room watched without saying anything. For some reason, the enforcer had taken it upon himself to regard CLU as a special charge; doing his best to protect the other program in every way possible. No one was certain why, exactly. Alan had put forth the theory that it was because Rinzler's base coding was still that of system security monitor; and CLU was the only program around that could possibly need to be protected.

The room was quiet for a few moments; the only sounds the humming of the refrigerator and the thin, far-off drone of the cicadas in the trees around the house. No one wanted to address the issue of CLU's story continuing. They all came from stories that had gone past CLU's, and knew how his story had to end. No one had the heart to tell the program; however, they all knew how seriously he took the commands issued by Flynn…CLU would only see the end of his story as failing to complete a mission given to him. And for a program that would only address his User as 'Sir' out of respect…failing his User would be unthinkable, the worst thing that he could ever do.

Finally, Alan spoke up. "They wouldn't forget about you, CLU. They asked others for ideas to keep you going further, to make your story better." Alan's voice was gentle, a low baritone as he continued. "They must be waiting until they know exactly what happens before they start to write the next chapter. Isn't it better to spend some more time here—with us—until then? This way they don't leave you hanging in limbo while they finish the chapter."

When CLU looked up, Rinzler gave the other program's shoulders a quick, reassuring squeeze and nodded his head in agreement with Alan.

"You really think so?" CLU asked Rinzler.

Rinzler nodded again and gently bumped his sharply angled helmet against CLU's head; nudging CLU until a tremulous smile appeared again on the hacking program's face.

"And I'm sure we make better company than some of the others from the rest of the stories…" Alan said.

Many of the others in the room suppressed a shudder at the thought of some of the inhabitants of the remaining stories that populated the writer's mind. PJ had summed it up once when a nightmare came close to rupturing one of the barriers between Mama Gee's home and a few of the darker stories. As the group had gathered in Mama Gee's yard and watched as the barrier thinned and strained, growing translucent in places and showing what else lay beyond and the on-going actions of those who lived in the other stories, the lanky farm manager had said softly, "Here there be monsters…"

Monsters they were; not in appearance but in actions.

Tron had been horrified, his base coding urging him to break the barrier and help the Users he saw on the other side. Only the sternly shouted override command from Alan had stopped him. PJ had loaded the rifle that he kept to deal with wild dogs and feral pigs. The farm manager watched white-faced with Ranger growling at his side until the barrier thickened and finally disappeared hours later. Mama Gee had stood wordless, her face stoic as she watched; however, Rinzler had noticed that Mama Gee had quietly and calmly ordered Charlene to unlatch the barn door and go inside the house until Mama Gee came to fetch her.

There had been others with them, a small crowd brought together in silence by the threat of what lay beyond. One of them, a big muscular man who carried a rifle as well had muttered something that sounded like "reavers…always needing grenades…" before stepping up to stand—tense and waiting—with the others.

The next day a large, bald man wearing goggles had walked up to the house, saying that he had been sent so they would have a monster of their own to help them fight if a barrier ever broke.

CLU let out a shaky breath that became a small laugh.

"Yes," he agreed, "much better company."

Heads raised all over the kitchen at the sound of the front door's screen door banging shut, followed by a teenaged girl's voice calling, "Auntie Gee? We got someone new here...he says he was supposed to come see you?"

"In the kitchen, Charlene!" Mama Gee called back.

A few moments more, and a slight, dark-haired boy who looked to be only twelve—maybe thirteen—years old was cautiously peering around the doorway into the kitchen. He glanced around nervously at the assorted adults in the room before his gaze settled on Mama Gee.

"The man out front said I should come talk to someone named 'Mama Gee'?" he said, sounding unsure.

Mama Gee straightened up slightly, wiping her hands on a kitchen towel that had rested on the table near her pan.

"I'm Mama Gee," she told him. "What's your name, child? How did you get here and what do you need to talk to me about?"

The boy squirmed a little in place under her gaze, saying, "My name's Hack—Hackett Jamison. I was looking for my sister, but I ended up outside of this house..."

"You looking for your sister?" Mama Gee asked, surprised. "What were you doing around these parts with your sister?"

Hackett looked as though on the verge of tears. "I don't know," he said, fighting the urge to sniffle a bit. "I was looking for her...and then I was here and I thought I had just started to look for her but it feels like it's been years and I don't know what to do or where to go..." The last few words broke down as he started to feel the tears spilling out of his eyes. He ducked his head and wiped his eyes with his hands, trying not to look like a crying baby in front of all the adults he could see around him.

PJ shook his head slightly. "Another stray for you to house, Mama Gee, ma'am," he said. "I reckon this is mostly my fault..."

PJ had spent too much time working farms and ranches to see anything wandering around lost. When the farm manager realized that he was a character—part of a writer's story—he had noticed that sometimes other charaters were simply wandering around. His best guess was that when the writer was not actively working on their story, characters would get lost; they slipped through the thin walls between stories and ended up wandering aimlessly throught the writer's mind until the writer began work on their story and they found themselves back home where they belonged.

It was when PJ began to round all of the loose characters up to take them back to his farm until they could return to their own stories that he learned he was one of the wandering characters. It had been difficult, trying to keep them all together and safe, until he brought them all to the safest place that he could find; tracking rumors of safe havens and refuges through imaginings and dreams, avoiding nightmares, until he found the safest place that could house them all...Mama Gee's.

Mama hadn't been thrilled to see them all appear on her doorstep—the last person who showed up uninvited had also been a strange sort of reckless that had the potential to cause extreme problems—however, she had just shaken her head and begun to assign sleeping arrangements and issue household rules.

At some point, the writer had understood where the characters were going and then other characters would drift in and out—some for only a day or two, others for longer—before moving on to their stories. Not all of the characters, only the ones deemed safe for Mama Gee's.

Mama Gee shot PJ a sharp-eyed look before making her way to the young boy in the doorway. "Nonsense, he's meant to be here," she told them, wrapping a big arm around Hackett. "Come over here; you're just in time for dinner. We'll get you some place to sleep afterwards, alrighty?"

Hackettnodded, sniffing a bit. He was hungry, and if this nice lady would help him...maybe he could find his sister.

"Alright, then," Mama Gee said. "Now, who told you to come talk to me?" she asked Hackett. She expected to hear that it was Charlene or the writer, maybe one of the characters that had moved on to their stories after spending time at Mama Gee's. Instead, she heard...

"The big bald man out on the porch...the one untying the knives that were hanging there..."

Mama Gee's head shot up and she was moving through the house at a rapid speed that surprised everyone there.

They could hear her yelling as she made her way through the house, "Dammit, I told you to leave my windchimes alone! I don't care how good you look, pretty boy, you keep your damn hands off of those knives!"

The others in the house couldn't make out what the deep, rumbling voice that answered her said, but it didn't matter. Mama Gee would get her way in the end.

After all, everybody loved Mama.

A/N-to learn what was visible through the barrier the night of the nightmare, please read 'Do You Take Song Requests?, chapters 2 and 3. May it serve as an example—after all, the cause of the nightmare served as inspiration...