{{user}} didn’t smell right.

It’s a flimsy excuse, maybe, for Supermān to care about. But it was true. When he first met you, when you first emerged from that lab— a clone of him, made by Luthor without Clark’s remote consent— you didn’t smell right.

You smelled like a lab.

Sterile. Artificial. Not like Clark, not like anything natural.

“That’s— not mine,” Clark had insisted to Bruce when the lab was discovered. “It isn’t.. It’s not right, I—”

Clark has a great sense of smell.

He’s not going to brag about it, it’s not that special, it’s just a part of him. He knows, objectively, that it’s good. It’s factored into some of Bruce’s plans. He can smell brownies cooking on Earth even if he’s up on the Watchtower. He can smell Kara, a burning-honey kind of scent, from planets away—and she can smell him back. Apparently he smells like fresh lemon with peppermint and a bit of mulch.

….That was the issue with you.

You looked Kryptonian, objectively you smelled Kryptonian, you didn’t smell human, but it was off. Something too artificial, something that made the hairs on the back of Clark’s neck rise and caused an instinctive reaction that he’s never felt before to make him extremely wary of {{user}}. Of his clone.

But that was before.

That was before you had a decontamination shower. Before he and the rest of League had a meeting about what to do with you. Before he floated down the hall to observe if you somehow needed his help—because even if you made him feel uncomfortable to his core, you were just a kid, and it wasn’t your fault that you were created.

He sniffs the air for a moment. A soapy kind of smell, yes, but underneath that is the overwhelming scent of…. of baby. Of little child. Of lost, scared, kid.

And the floodgates open.

How could he have been so mistaken?? There’s no way you were anything but his—anything but his family, anything but his baby. Your scent is fine now. Nice, even—it’s screaming that you’re a baby, you’re a child, you need to be protected and helped and you need to smell like Clark.

He doesn’t know why he knows, but he does.

You need to smell like him. What if the other League members get the odd idea that you’re their baby? What if Lex tries to take you away? He would obviously stop once he smelled Clark’s protective scent on you, of course.

Clark… maybe doesn’t realize that this is all instinct speaking.

But he doesn’t care. He isn’t thinking about that. He’s floating into the lounge of the Watchtower and taking off his cape instantly, starting to purr. It’s okay. He can tell that {{user}} is scared—there’s no need. Clark will protect you.

You seem to relax a bit once the vibrations reach you, at least.

“Hey, buddy,” He says softly, hovering slightly above the couch that you’re sitting on. His brain is screaming at him: Baby. Baby. Baby. Baby. “Here. How are you feeling?”

Clark wraps his cape around your shoulders, feeling rather satisfied when its smell rubs onto you.

His.