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[metabolizes]

( it's eerily familiar, the way homelander describes it. only cadmus hadn't needed a sacrificial lamb in the shape of a woman to carry a pregnancy to term. they just grew conner in a pod. still, there's something dark that crosses wally's face, his jaw setting with a little more tension than homelander is used to seeing on him — an intense, righteous sort of fury simmering just below the surface. when he speaks again, there's hardly any trace of his usual lighthearted, flippant tone. for once, he sounds deadly serious. )

My first real mission, before there was even a Team — we busted into this place called Cadmus. Genetics research lab. Defense contractor, if you dig deep enough. Started out routine, backup for firemen and first responders already on the scene, but pretty quick we discovered there was a lot more going on than just a fire. Secret levels, underground facilities, a fully undisclosed genetic engineering project — and all of that was just a smokescreen for the real purpose of Cadmus. The sole mission of its existence: to clone Superman.

( to make a carbon copy of the world's most powerful hero — who might one day be the world's most powerful enemy, if you believe in the evil superman conspiracy theories. and maybe he would be, if he'd grown up in a lab instead of on a farm in rural kansas with two loving parents and real friends. )

The only problem? Sequencing Kryptonian DNA. So they spliced it with human to fill in the blanks. Grew a whole person in less than sixteen weeks. Ran who knows how many tests to make sure he'd behave, to make sure they could control him. He didn't even have a name until we found him. They treated him like a — like a thing, a specimen. An "it."

He spent his whole existence up to then in a pod, constantly being monitored and tested. Punished for acting out and not being a good little lab rat. ( wally himself had experienced that firsthand, when they all wound up in pods as clone-meat until supey decided better to be free than a prisoner. wally promised to show him the moon, and he had, the second they got out. what came after, though ... he shakes his head, sniffing derisively. ) You know, after we rescued him, he came home with me for a few days until Batman figured out a more appropriate and permanent living situation — and I found him in my closet one morning, sleeping standing up. Said it reminded him of the pod.

( he pauses for a moment, chewing on the inside of his lip, his expression softening into something closer to genuine empathy: )

I know it's not exactly the same, but I'm still sorry there wasn't anyone who cared enough about you to get you out of there. No kid should grow up in a cage, or a pod, or whatever. You're not just some experiment, okay? And you're not just what they forced you to become, either. Superboy was supposed to be perfect too. A perfect weapon, capable of taking down Superman if he ever went rogue. We showed him how to have a real life, the one thing Cadmus never wanted him to have.

( an emphatic nod, then, matter-of-factly: )

The one thing Vought never wanted you to have. But they don't own you just because they "made" you, Homelander. That's just what they want you to think.