"Crap. Don't die on me now, idiot." Clint Barton said as he fiddled with his hearing aid. He was on his way to an important Avengers meeting and he was already going to be late. "Ugh, I don't want to go through another pair! These things are freaking expensive on a SHIELD paycheck…." Clint said as he tried to fix them.
After a few minutes, he gave up. "Fine. I'll have to find out if they work on the way. Cap's gonna kill me." Clint said and speedily walked out of his temporary apartment he used whenever he was in the city. The Avengers Tower was only a few blocks away, making it convenient walking distance instead of driving through New York traffic.
Within ten minutes, he arrived at his destination and made his way up to the meeting room. After entering Stark's security codes, he walked in to see the whole team of 6 gathered together. Stark, Cap, Bruce, Thor, Nat, and Hill. "Sorry I'm late guys." He said and sat in his seat.
"When are you not late, Hawkman?" Tony replied softly. 'Crap,' Clint thought, 'Tony is never quiet, these things must not be working properly.'
"Haha Stark." Clint replied while rolling his eyes.
Hill stood up. "Now that we're all here, good job on the last mission guys. This is mainly an update meeting to let you know what we'll do from here."
"Ooooo, SHIELD isn't giving us a new mission yet? That's a miracle! Next we'll be hearing they're giving us a vacation." Tony replied while putting his feet up on the table.
Clint was getting annoyed, hearing everyone at a third of the volume wasn't fun. 'Maybe I should up the amplitude….' He thought and casually placed his hand to the side of his head, as if he was scratching his ear. The other Avengers didn't know about his hearing issue, all except Natasha and Hill, but he didn't want the rest to find out. It was a personal issue.
As he continued to fix his invisible-from-sight hearing aid, as casually as possible, he tried to listen to Hill's talk.
"Actually, SHIELD did decide to give you guys a few days off. It's not a vacation but it's something."
Stark gasped, "What? SHIELD is giving us some time off? No way."
As Clint was trying to up the volume on his hearing aid, it made a high pitched squeal before giving him a tiny electrical shock in his ear. "Crap!" He said before taking it out as fast and as discretely as he could, but he knew he wasn't too discreet about it.
Clint looked up, seeing the team looking in his direction as Tony's mouth was moving, but not being able to hear anything but a low mutter. The other hearing aid must have blown out too. He lost 80% of his hearing as a kid, so he could barely hear anything without his aids. It was good he knew how to read lips because it often came in handy when his dependable hearing aids went out of commission.
As Tony continued to speak, Clint did his best to read his lips. He said something along the lines of, "I'm with Clint, calling bullcrap on that. SHIELD never gives us time off unless they think we're getting sloppy."
Everyone's eyes had reverted back to Stark and Hill, all eyes except for Natasha. Just by looking at her, Clint knew she understood his hearing aids were having problems, but he decided to ignore her glances and try reading the conversation. He looked over at Hill, who started speaking next. She looked at Tony dead in the face, as if sick of his sarcastic comments. Her lips said, "Yeah, SHIELD does think you guys are getting sloppy. That's why they're giving you a break."
Clint heard more mumbling he couldn't make out, and saw eyes dart across the table to another person. So he followed them to see who was speaking. It was Cap. He said, "I for one am not complaining, we could all use a break. But I'm sure Fury didn't just send you down here for that. Let's get on with the past mission debriefing."
As the meeting continued, they just talked about if the people they helped were okay, and what time the criminals were serving. The usual debriefing conversation. However, Clint was only half paying attention, since not being able to hear annoyed him to no end.
He looked down at his hands in his lap, holding the tiny malfunctioning hearing aid. After a moment of looking at it, sick that he had to buy another one, he decided to take the dead aid out of his other ear. But when he finished and looked back up at the conversation, everyone was talking at once. Cap was talking, Tony, Hill, Thor, Bruce, and Nat all seemed to be arguing. He couldn't decipher what they were all saying at once through lip reading in this muffled room. That was a pet peeve, being deaf and people talking over one another.
Clint slipped his hearing aids into his pocket, stood up, and pounded on the table to get their attention. "Hey! Guys! One at a time, please!"
The room went silent as they stopped speaking to look at him, and Clint sat back down. "Now one of you, start from the top."
He scanned the room again to see who would speak first. It was Tony, to no one's surprise. He mouthed, "Have you even been paying attention Hawkeye? SHIELD is back at it again, keeping us in the dark about important information!"
He sighed. "Sorry, I've been a bit distracted today. But why is that breaking news? SHIELD does that all the time, and nothing is going to stop them from hiding half of the facts. Me and Nat have been in this business longer than you folks, and it's something you have to get used to."
He looked at Tony but didn't realize that Cap started speaking until he was half way through his statement. "...facts to help them."
Clint hated to do this, but he didn't understand what he said with that fragment he read. Cap would need to repeat it. "What did you say? Sorry, I didn't quite catch that."
He heard the soft mutter of Tony's snarky remarks and turned back. "...have hearing problems? Or are you just not paying attention?"
Hill mouthed something and she said, "Are your hearing aids working Clint?"
He mentally facepalmed. 'Why the hell would Hill say that? She should know I want to keep that quiet!' He thought as Tony looked at Clint, "You have hearing aids Barton?"
He laughed and tried to play it off. "Why would I need hearing aids? I'm not that old."
Maria Hill looked at Clint confused, and then looked at everyone else who were just as confused. "Wait…. You didn't tell them? Why wouldn't you tell them that?"
Natasha and Clint both face palmed. "What the hell Maria! Didn't you get the memo I wanted that to stay quiet?"
Tony started moving his lips, probably saying something like, 'Whaaaaat? Old Mr. Hawkman actually has hearing aids?' But Clint decided to ignore Tony for the moment and focus on Hill's words. She said, "Well we got the memo that you were keeping it on the hush side, but I thought the Avengers would have known. Fury didn't give us all the details."
Clint sighed. "Leave it to Fury to leave out half of the important information..."
He saw Bruce talking and turned to him. "Well, if you do have hearing aids, are they working correctly?"
He sat back in his seat and took the broken hearing aids out of his pocket, putting them on the table. "No, they stopped working this morning. Third pair this year."
Clint looked to see who would talk next, seeing Cap speak. "Are you still able to hear us right now?"
"No, right now I only hear quiet mumbles." He replied.
He was surprised to see Thor talking next. "How is it you understand us, Barton?" He asked, confused.
"I can read lips pretty well." Clint answered simply.
There were nods around the room as they seemed to understand, but Cap spoke again. "Why didn't you want us to find out about your hearing?"
He sighed and paused, thinking of how he should answer. "It's a private issue. I had it ever since I was a kid and I don't want people to see me differently because of it. Or hear Tony's jokes." Clint stated, not actually going into the main reason he didn't want them to find out. This team has only been together less than a year, and he didn't know these Avengers too well. He didn't want them to ask how it happened. He didn't particularly have a good childhood and he didn't like discussing it with just anyone.
"Well, no one is seeing you differently because of it. But I do think we should finish up this meeting so you can get those hearing aids fixed." Cap replied looking back at Hill.
She was annoyed at cutting the meeting short, but she could manage. "Okay. I'll talk to Fury and tell him to stop holding back important information about the missions, among other things. See if I can convince him to cut you some slack. That should basically conclude this meeting."
Cap nodded. "Thanks Hill."
With that, they all stood up and started filing out of the room. Clint picked up his broken hearing aids with a sigh and was about to leave, but Tony put his hand on his shoulder and pulled him to the side. "Yeah Tony? I would prefer if you would restrain from the snarky comments." He replied. If Clint was being honest, he wasn't the biggest fan of Tony Stark: the genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist.
Tony seemed to laugh. "I wasn't going to say any. But I was going to ask if you wanted hearing aids that won't break every 2 months?"
Clint smiled. "Yeah, actually. I would appreciate that."
"Good. Stop by tomorrow morning and I'll have some fixed up for you. Stark Style." Tony said with a smile before walking off to his lab.
'Maybe Tony isn't that bad of a guy….' Clint thought to himself as he headed to his apartment.
Clint arrived back at the tower the next day, super glad that he would be able to hear in a few minutes. He took the elevator to the lab and was greeted by Tony. Clint couldn't hear what he was saying because he was looking down at the table, but Tony motioned him over with his hand so he walked over.
Clint looked at the tiny device he was working on, probably putting finishing touches on it. After a minute, Tony looked up at Clint and he read his lips.
"Here, just pop these in your ears and tell me how well they work. Put this end in first." He said and motioned to one side before handing the two small hearing aids to Clint.
Clint carefully placed them in his ears and instantly heard the difference. "Can you hear?" Tony asked.
Clint could actually hear him, which caused him to smile. "Wow... yeah, I can hear. Significantly better than with my old ones too."
Tony smiled. "That's how you make them, the Stark way!" He said proudly. "Do they fit well? I can change the size a bit if they're too big or small."
"No, I think they're good. But I'll wear them around for a bit and let you know." There was a brief moment before Clint spoke again. "Thanks Tony. You didn't have to do this."
Tony slapped Clint's shoulder. "Ey, we're a team Katniss. We all have to look out for each other. And oh! These hearing aids are so much better than the ones you buy in the store! They're waterproof, can withstand extremely loud noises and will adjust automatically so it doesn't blow out your brain, they're completely invisible when in your ear, and it's backed with the Stark lifetime warranty."
Clint laughed. "Yeah, that stuff will come in handy when on these crazy SHIELD missions. Thanks Stark, you're not too shabby."
"Shabby? That's something an old man says."
Clint rolled his eyes. "Well, we're basically the same age. So you're an old man too."
"Hey!" Tony pouted. "I resent that remark."
Clint shook his head and started walking out of the lab. "Bye Stark."
As he was about to leave, Tony spoke. "Hey, can I ask you something?"
He turned to face Tony. "Depends. What?"
Tony was hesitant but eventually asked, "How did you lose your hearing? Were you born with it or something."
Clint still didn't want to tell people he lost his hearing due to his father hitting him one too many times. So he simply replied, "Or something." And continued walking out.
"You can't just leave me on a cliffhanger, Legolas!"
Clint just saluted Tony as he left. "Yes I can."
With that, Clint went on with enjoying SHIELD's mini vacation.
A/N: Hello! I just wrote this small story about Clint because I've been reading a ton of Hawkeye comics lately where he lost part of his hearing. I just wanted to include that into the movie universe and make a story on how the team might have discovered this fact about Clint. I hope you enjoyed my little take on this! Happy Holidays!:)