FicWad

-=-=-=-

Harry sighed as he settled into the copilot's seat, right beside a pensive-looking Morpheus. It had been a long day, even though all he had been allowed to do was pace inside the ship as he waited for his captain to return from his trip inside the Matrix. And now it was about to get even longer, as they cut their current patrol short to get their urgent news to Zion.

"Settle down," Morpheus said quietly, watching him with little expression on his face. "I'm sure the Council will see reason."

"Yes, sir," the boy murmured. "I'm just... nervous."

The hovership captain reached out and tousled hair that didn't need it, prompting a look from Harry that wavered between annoyed and grateful. "Don't be. We'll just take things as they come."

Harry nodded, but nevertheless cast a worried look down towards the hands clasped in his lap. It was all well and good for Morpheus to tell him not to be nervous when he had absolutely no idea why his apprentice was nervous in the first place. Commander Lock, the man Harry had first encountered that single, terrifying time in front of the Council, was of the firm belief that what happened in the real world was far more important than what occurred in the Matrix, and his voice was a great influence on the Council.

Harry wasn't stupid; far from it, according to his family. But he knew that so long as Lock believed that his going to Hogwarts would only help within the Matrix, while it cost what Harry knew it would in resources to keep him in the computer-generated world for that length of time, the commander would come down like a wall of granite against them. If they wanted to convince the Council that sending Harry to Hogwarts was worthwhile, they would need Lock's help, not his hindrance. And to do that, Harry had to convince him first that the knowledge to be gained would be as useful in reality as it would be in the Matrix.

Harry needed to show him magic was real, when he hadn't even informed his family of that little fact.

-=-=-=-

The Nebuchadnezzar shivered as her hull kissed the platform, and then shivered again, harder, as the docking clamps closed around her and her ionic engines shut down. The engines crackled and popped as they cooled down, serenading her pilots young and old with a mechanical symphony as they went over the post-flight checklist.

Trinity stood with her hands on her son's shoulders, feeling how tension had knotted them. "Hey, relax," she whispered, squeezing a bit. "Things are going to be fine."

To her surprise, Harry flinched a bit. After a moment, one of his hands reached up to cover hers. "Mum, there's... there's something I need to tell you."

The woman frowned. She hadn't heard that kind of pure nervousness in Harry's voice in... well over a year. "All right," she said softly, twisting her hand to hold his tight. "What is it?" Beside them she was aware of Morpheus' attention, though the captain's eyes were on his readouts.

He swallowed. "I... the teleporting, it's..."

Trinity waited as he visibly gathered himself, getting more worried by the second. She knew Harry trusted her, even more than he trusted any other member of their ersatz little clan, so the fact that he hesitated this much... Still frowning in concern, she stepped around the chair until she could see her son's face. Harry was biting his bottom lip bloody, his eyes downcast. When she tipped his chin up those green eyes only met hers reluctantly, and there was a deep-seated fear there that she'd only seen once before.

"Harry, what's our rule?" she asked, her voice barely above a murmur, but Harry only stared back at her helplessly. God damn it, but she'd really thought they were beyond this! "You. Are not. A freak. You have a gift, a truly amazing thing that most people can only dream about. But even if you didn't, you'd still be my son." Trinity ran her fingers through his untidy hair, and he leaned into the touch. "My son, understood? Birth doesn't matter. And no matter what you do, or whatever happens, that will never change."

The moment of silence lasted for a breath. Then another, and a third. And then, finally, Harry gave her the tiniest of nods and opened his mouth to speak.

"Hey! What are you guys waiting for, an ingraved invitation?" Link demanded, poking his head inside the cockpit. "It's gonna take time to gather the Council, but that doesn't mean we've got all day!"

Trinity came as close as she ever had to punching a fellow crewmember in that moment, as she watched Harry's face close down. She started to reach toward him, but the boy slipped beneath her arm and past Link, who stared after him, confused. "Did I... interrupt something?"

"Yes," she replied through gritted teeth, sharing a long look with Morpheus. "And I think it might have been important."

-=-=-=-

By the time she and Morpheus had caught up with Harry, he was waiting with Neo near the exit from the docks down into the city proper. "We need to talk to Commander Lock before we see the Council," he said quietly as they approached, prompting looks of surprise from each of the adults. Harry had never been able to hide the face that he found the commander more than a little intimidating, on the rare occasions that they met.

"And why would that be?" Morpheus questioned with a stern eyebrow raised, and Harry flushed.

"If... if we're going to do this, if I'm going to go to Hogwarts, we're going to need his help," the boy replied. "If he's against us, then it won't happen."

The captain nodded. "Agreed, but given that I'm the one proposing this, I find it unlikely Lock will decide to champion our cause."

Harry swallowed, glancing between them all. "I... I think I can convince him. Maybe. If we can talk to him privately, before the Council meets."

Morpheus's stare was drilling holes into Harry's head, and apprehensively the young pilot met his mentor's eyes. "I do believe," the man said slowly, "that after this is over, we will be having a long talk."

Harry swallowed again. "Yes, sir," he whispered.

Morpheus gave him a short, abrupt nod. "Very well. Go to one of the conference rooms off the Council Chamber," he instructed Trinity. "I'll find Lock and meet you there."

His second-in-command bowed her head, still shooting her son confused and increasingly worried looks as the captain strode away.

-=-=-=-

Though it didn't show on his face, in his heart of hearts Jason Lock was fuming as he followed Morpheus through Zion's maze of corridors. He didn't like the man, for many reasons, but he still owed him the courtesy due a ship's captain under his command. Which meant that, as much as he'd have liked to, he couldn't actually strangle the other man for insisting that they needed privacy before Morpheus could explain why this little tête-à-tête was so urgent.

It was a surprise to see most of Morpheus's crew waiting for them in the small conference room not far from where the Council was gathering. Neo and Trinity looked as puzzled as he himself felt, but the kid they'd taken in looked up at Lock as though he were a death sentence approaching.

"This had better be good," Lock muttered to the hovership captain, folding his arms behind his back in a position he knew made him look even more intimidating.

"It is," Morpheus answered just as quietly, and began to fill him in.

Lock's initial skepticism only grew the longer the other man spoke. Not that these things were possible; the commander knew he was stubborn to the point where others called him pig-headed, but he was perfectly capable of accepting the evidence of his own eyes. Young Ensign Potter's demonstration before the Council years ago had been proof enough that there was more to the Matrix than they had thought. Indeed, he would have been more surprised if the Machines had not made their control so elaborate.

No, his disbelief lay in the way Morpheus seemed to truly believe that his cockamamie scheme to send Potter to this 'Hogwarts' place was worth pursuing. Potter would learn some very interesting things there, he was sure, but the sheer expenditure in resources and manpower was too much to contemplate for what, in the end, would benefit them only in what was really just a glorified computer game. The Matrix wasn't where men fought and pushed back the Machines, though they often died there all the same.

The war was fought here, in the real world, and Lock said as much in words that, he hoped, cut to the bone. It was then that the boy at last spoke up, his green eyes both fearful and determined.

"It's real."

A silence fell in the room, and all eyes turned to him. Potter flushed, but stood straight. "The magic is real. I... I'm sorry I didn't tell you sooner, but... I was afraid."

Still none of the adults spoke, and the child's gaze turned to search the room. Fixing on an empty spot, he stared at it for a few moments, and then closed his eyes.

And then there was a quiet 'pop'.

-=-=-=-

The buzz among the Council was loud and uncertain; Captain Morpheus's report was nearly beyond belief, and the proposal he'd laid down before them was either preposterous or visionary. None had forgotten his overzealous blunder in freeing Neo, but neither could they help but recall how he had brought them a wizard- now that they knew the correct term for what Harry was, a few of them were using it with gusto.

"It's impossible," one member claimed.

"It's difficult, not impossible," another corrected him. "But is it worth it?"

Councilor Dillard had remained silent, up until now, watching the Council she presided over with sharp eyes the same gray as her hair. She beckoned for an aide and whispered in his ear; he hurried away, and she rose from her seat. "Enough!"

The Chamber quieted until every eye was on her. "Before we can decide whether or not to support the captain's plan, we must know whether or not it is feasible. We will wait to cast our votes until after we have heard from the programmers and the engineers. However..."

She cast her gaze over the crew members standing supportively behind Morpheus in the center of the room. Neo and Trinity each had a hand on their adoptive son's shoulders, but the boy still looked unbearably tense as he stared right back at her. "I would like to hear another opinion on the usefulness of this information. Commander Lock!"

The supreme commander of Zion's military forces stood even more to attention and squarely met Dillard's eyes. He hadn't yet spoken a word during the session, a surprise given the known animosity between himself and Captain Morpheus, and the Council Head was very interested to know why. "Tell me. What is your opinion of this mad scheme?"

Lock considered for a long moment, aware of the attention focused on him. "It would be expensive," he began. "In both our finite resources and man-hours. It has a high possibility of failure, due to circumstances beyond our control. There would be no immediate benefit, and any advantages gained would be uncertain at this time."

She almost nodded in approval, pleased that he'd put aside his dislike for the time being to give them an honest, if conservative appraisal. Then, however, he continued, and shocked the Council.

"But," he said slowly and reluctantly, as though the words were acid in his mouth, "despite my doubts, I will support Captain Morpheus's plan."