What if Neo wasn't the One? What if the One was a little boy with green eyes...?
Know Thyself: the Prelude is a Harry Potter/The Matrix Crossover fanfic by Hoshi-tachi that can be read on Fanfiction Dot Net here
. The story is continued on Know Thyself.
Contains the following tropes
- Butterfly of Doom: The canon events of The Matrix occurred a year prior - including Cypher's betrayal and the crew-members he killed - but Neo is not the One. While Neo was still able to adapt to reality and becoming a full-time member of the Nebuchadnezzar, it is implied that Neo still resents Morpheus for getting his hopes up and unplugging him for it. When Harry shows promise of being the One, Morpheus does not get his hopes up and decides to wait and see what happens, though he decides to take Harry on as an apprentice.
- Doing in the Scientist: Throughout the fanfic, a lot of the unusual circumstances surrounding Harry that were revealed to be magic in the Harry Potter canon are passed off as Harry being a Child Prodigy at manipulating the false reality of the Matrix just like every other redpill, until Harry discovers that he can teleport in the Real World too, implying that it really is magic.
- Guardian Entity: When Oracle meets Harry and recognizes him for what he was, she sends Seraph to protect him, the man in white appearing almost out of nowhere to fend off a group of agents that try to ambush the new family.
- Happily Adopted: It did not take long for Trinity to grow attached to Harry - and vice versa - the moment she found him, using his redpill sense of awareness as an excuse to take him away from his abusive family. After unplugging him, Trinity and Neo adopt him instead of taking him to Zion's orphanage, with Harry regarding Tank as a fun uncle and Morpheus as a kind of authoritative grandfather (although as far as Zion's concerned, Harry's also down on paper as Morpheus's apprentice to justify his presence).
- In Spite of a Nail: While Neo isn't the One and it is implied that Agent Smith hasn't been destroyed yet, Neo and Trinity still become an Official Couple, and Cypher still betrayed them and killed Mouse, Dozer, Apoc and Switch.
- Laser-Guided Karma: Harry's abusive uncle Vernon literally didn't know what hit him when Trinity kills him instantly in the middle of beating Harry.
- Mama Bear: The moment Trinity sees Vernon kicking Harry, she walks up to the fat man and breaks his neck, and the more she learns about Harry's physical condition prior to being unplugged, the more she regrets not having taken more time before killing Vernon.
- Prophecy Twist: The Oracle told Trinity she would come to love the One, and she believed falling in love with Neo as a proof he was the One — except that he wasn't. The true One actually is nine-year-old Harry, whom Trinity grows to love in a maternal rather than romantic way.
- Psychic Children: Before he was unplugged, at only nine years old, Harry could sense the general presence of Agents, had a general feeling of Trinity's status as a redpill, somehow manages to make him and Trinity invisible to agents looking for her and has had multiple experiences that imply to him that the Matrix is a false reality.
- Residual Self-Image: Trinity is nearly moved to tears when she looks at Harry's self-image on his first return trip to the Matrix, dressed in baggy grey clothing that's still too large for him, showing his lack of self-confidence after years of abuse.
- Teleportation: When Trinity brings Harry into a jumping sim so that he can learn to jump on command, instead he accidentally apparates next to her. This is portrayed as a unique ability, one enough for Morpheus to bring up and demonstrate to the Council why he chose Harry to be his apprentice.
- Unfazed Everyman: Harry takes it astonishingly well when he is unplugged and told the full extent of the Earth's decimated state and their war with the machines. This is justified since what he thought was originally "normal" was him being beaten senseless for not being "normal" by his family and the crew on the Nebuchadnezzar treated him with more kindness than they ever did, not to mention the fact that the Rebels have made it a rule to unplug them at around Harry's age because children are less susceptible to going mad when unplugged, not having been in the Matrix as long as adults.
