So this is my first Hawkeye-centric fic. I'm basing this story off of Matt Fraction, Jeff Lemire, and Ramon Perez's Hawkeye comics.

If you're confused as to why I have Clint 1. Deaf and 2. Wearing hearing aids, please go ahead and read the Lemire/Perez comic, not only because it'll answer questions but also because the whole Hawkeye series of these comics are amazing. 3. And because Deaf Clint is canon.

This story is post AoU, in case you didn't see my previous description.

If you do like this story, go ahead and review. Even if it's just to tell me (nicely) that a sentence doesn't make sense or whatever.

Without further ado, please enjoy!

Chapter 1: Do No Harm

. . .

Clint glanced over from his place on the couch, faintly hearing someone yelling and seeing Steve looking over at that possible someone. He turned up the hearing aid in his ear and cringed a bit when he heard the yelling now, having turned up the hearing aid too high.

"Ahh," he groaned. "What's going on?"

Tony walked over to him and threw his arms up. "I've only been offering you a beer for the past ten minutes. I was beginning to think you weren't even in the room. By the way, so glad I could spend all my time and hard work into making you those hearing aids just so you can take them out or turn them off or whatever."

Clint gave a half-embarrassed smirk. "Sorry. I just needed to think without all the noise."

Tony handed a beer to Steve who reached out and grabbed it before he set one down in front of the archer. He then sat down on the couch next to him and sighed.

"It's fine. I get it. I'd probably do the same thing too if I were in your shoes."

Steve smiled now and laughed. "A world without Tony listening in on conversations or talking so much. That'd be something. It would be a much quieter world."

Tony raised his eyebrows and glanced over at Clint as he also laughed a bit before opening his beer. He looked over at Steve now with a teasing look. "First of all, rude. Second of all, I have an AI that I built and unfortunately for you, he's a spitting personality of me so you would have to deal with a second me, no matter what. Oh, and he can also lock all of you inside here and 'forget' to turn the sprinklers on in case of a fire."

Steve shook his head, still chuckling before he calmed down enough to take a sip of his own beer.

When Tony turned back to Barton, he saw him shaking his head. "No, you're wrong. Man, I love saying that." When he saw Tony's confused look, he shrugged. "Come on, man. I mean, okay. Jarvis is, technically, a robot -"

Tony looked at him skeptically as he interrupted. "Uh no, actually. Jarvis is Just A Rather Very Intelligent System. A system is not a robot. A robot is like one of my suits –"

"Whatever, Stark. We're not going to argue semantics. My point is that as a thing with robotic technology, he has to obey the laws of Robotics, and one of those laws is that it can't put humans in danger," Clint explained.

"So?"

"So, he wouldn't be able to not turn on the sprinklers and let all of us burn to death! It would be against his law of harming a human being…"

Tony stared at him, his mouth agape, shaking his head. "I am… speechless. It is really amazing where you come up with all of this. Where did you come up with these Laws of Robotics, pray tell?"

Clint looked over at Steve who looked just as mystified as Tony. "Oh come on, seriously? Does no one else read in this damn place?"

"Uh… I… I read," a voice spoke from the kitchen.

Clint turned around to see Bruce shyly raising his hand. "Well, good. At least you know where I'm going with this, then."

Bruce nodded and crossed his arms in front of his chest. "Yeah, the Laws of Robotics. Issac Asimov, Asimov's Laws, right? I, Robot and all of that?" He looked over at a still confused Tony and Steve and chuckled. "They're science fiction books. One of the Laws is that a robot may not harm or injure a human being."

"Well, okay," Tony sighed in defeat. "Whatever. You'd still feel my wrath even if I was deaf. Speaking of deaf, how are the hearing aids working? Still okay?"

Tony's tone of voice had changed from dismissive to serious, focusing his attention back on Barton. When it came to Stark tech and his friends and team mates, he wanted to make sure things were working as they should be, lest something goes wrong on a mission.

Clint nodded now. "Yeah, it works great. Thanks again, by the way."

Tony took a sip of his beer as he leaned back on the couch. "Of course. What kind of millionaire genius would I be if I didn't help out a fellow Avenger in need? Besides, you'd be no good to us unable to hear anything."

Clint also relaxed on the couch, putting his feet up on the coffee table. "Yeah, it's too bad I'm blind. Oh wait, I'm not. I can still shoot arrows, unlucky for you."

Steve chuckled now and glanced over at Bruce who was quiet, but also softly laughing.

Tony jokingly bumped his shoulder into the archer's. "I meant with our communicators. You wouldn't be able to hear what our plans were."

"I know," Clint rolled his eyes. "I just thought I would screw with you, Stark."

Tony smirked. "You can't afford to screw with me, and I mean that in every way and shape possible. I help make your high tech arrows, not to mention all the upgrades I'm constantly making to pretty much everything to make our lives easier." He looked up and over at Bruce whose eyes seemed preoccupied. "Hey, you need me for something, Banner?"

Clint looked over at Bruce who was now looking timid. He shook his head but there was sadness in his eyes.

"No, thank you. Sorry, I was just… spacing out. I'm going to go work in the lab upstairs for a while," he replied before he turned around and started towards the elevator.

Steve looked over at Tony worriedly. "Do you think he's really okay?"

Tony sighed and took a longer sip of his beer before he set it down on the table and stood up. "I don't, in fact. My Iron Man senses are tingling… I'm going to keep him company, keep an eye on him. I'll see you in a few hours for dinner. Whoever's cooking, don't make breakfast for dinner again!"

Clint looked up at him. "What's wrong with breakfast for dinner? It's the dinner of Americans!"

Tony looked down and shook his head. "You're not serious… you're actually asking what's wrong with having it? We've had it for almost four days in a row now! Is it the only thing you know how to cook or what, Barton?"

The other man held his hands out in and shrugged before he took another sip of his beer. "I can cook other things too…." He trailed off. "I just like breakfast."

Tony roughly ruffled Barton's hair. "Make something else or I'm going to cook and by cook, I mean order from Shawarma's. See you troublemakers later."

Steve and Clint both chuckled, now alone in the room. They watched television for a while and made casual conversation before Steve cleared his throat.

"So, um… if you don't mind me asking, what caused you to go deaf in the first place?"

Clint took a long drink now and gave an uncomfortable half-smile. He shifted in his place on the leather couch. "I uhh… didn't have the nicest father growing up and… I was an actual troublemaker. Well, actually, I guess more correctly, I was a curious kid. My father didn't like us, my brother and me, being curious about anything. He just… wanted us to obey his orders, do what he told us to do, without question. He'd… uh… he'd beat me on a pretty regular basis, even when I tried to stay out of his way."

Steve gave his friend a sympathetic look now, nodding in understanding. "Where was your mother?"

Clint shrugged. "She left as soon as she could. She found another man and left my brother Barney and me with our dad. I know she wanted to take us with her but… the other man didn't like kids and she loved him, so… she left."

Steve wet his lips and looked down at his beer. "I'm sorry, Barton."

The archer shrugged. "It was a long time ago. I just try not to think about either of my parents. My father makes me so angry sometimes,"

He saw Steve nod and after a moment, and another sip of beer, he spoke again. "What was your father like?"

Steve straightened up a bit and gave him a half smile. "He was okay. He tried his best to be a good father but it was the 1920s and we were poor. He worked low paying jobs almost all day and he got frustrated sometimes. He didn't… hurt me or anything, but… he drank and he drank hard. He hurt my mother once but… he never did it again. He died when I was seven, and my mother died when I was a teenager so my father didn't really have any major impact on my life, like yours did."

"It's good to know that shitty fathers are universal. Or, I suppose it's not good," Clint chuckled.

Steve chuckled weakly, staring curiously at Clint's hearing aid that was just barely peeking out of his visible ear in Steve's line of vision. "Have you always had hearing aids or just since you became Hawkeye?"

"I had to lip read a lot when I was younger, or have Barney write what he wanted to say to me, and then a lot of my teenage years was spent learning sign language but then I realized that wouldn't do me any good unless someone else knew it too. I pretty much had really shitty hearing aids that I never wore either because they were annoying or uncomfortable," Clint explained, looking visibly more comfortable talking about the hearing aid itself rather than his loss of hearing.

Steve listened and nodded in acknowledgement. He scratched his temple in thought. "Thank God for Stark tech, huh?"

Clint nodded and also laughed. "Definitely. It's nice to be able to hardly feel it in there but also still be able to take them out when I want to."

Steve nodded in agreement, silent for a minute or two before he fingered the glass bottle in his hands. "Do you think Stark regrets what he did? Building Ultron and everything?"

Clint let this question sink in before he took a sip and sighed.

"Yeah, I think he is regretful," Barton answered honestly. "A lot of people died, and… he didn't want that. Tony might seem like a selfish asshole but he didn't see any of the bad stuff happening when he made Ultron. Are you still pissed at him?"

Steve looked down at his lap and chewed on his lip thoughtfully.

"I don't know. I thought that I put it behind us but there are just some days when I blame Tony completely. I get so angry that he could be so thoughtless and stupid, and I just feel like I'm reliving that day all over again, you know?"

Clint clenched his jaw now and looked down at his own lap. "It wasn't his fault about the kid getting riddled with bullets though, Steve. That was… that was my fault, and you shouldn't blame Tony for that."

Steve automatically started shaking his head once Clint mentioned Quicksilver. His eyes turned sympathetic again and he set his half-drunken bottle down on the table beside him.

"Clint, that wasn't your fault. You need to stop blaming yourself for what happened to him. He made the conscious decision to save your life; he knew the danger. There's only some days when I blame Tony for that but then I have to remind myself that he made a sacrifice so you could save an innocent life."

Barton shook his head, already getting close to breaking down. He looked away from the Cap and he finished off his beer before he stood up. He swallowed the bitter liquid down and side-stepped around him.

"Thanks, man. I get what you're saying but… all I'm trying to say is that it's not Tony's fault. Don't be mad at him."

Steve watched helplessly now as Clint threw out his bottle before he headed towards the elevator.

Once the doors of the elevator closed, he leaned against the wall and ran his hands through his hair, his eyes tearing up slightly. Since That Day in Sokovia, he had never been able to forgive himself. He had always told himself that it was his fault that the kid had died. So many Ifs.

If the little boy hadn't wandered away from his mother, he wouldn't have had to go after him and Quicksilver would still be alive. If he never went after the boy, maybe Quicksilver wouldn't have to sacrifice his life. If Clint had ended his life to protect someone else, he wouldn't have had to see his teammate die.

No, stop it, Hawkeye. Don't think that way.

He rubbed his eyes now and took a deep breath when all he wanted to do was sink to the bottom of the elevator.

"Excuse me, Mr. Barton," a voice interrupted his thoughts. "It appears as though you are in distress, according to your increased heartrate. Is there anything I can do to assist you?"

Clint shook his head but then remembered that Jarvis couldn't actually see him, or maybe he could. Clint didn't know for sure.

"No, thank you, Jarvis. I'd rather just suffer in silence."

"That seems ill-advised."

Clint cracked a small smirk. "Jarvis, if all of us were in a room together and the room was on fire, would you let us all burn to death?"

There was an amusing moment of silence as the AI appeared to take time to think about the question, perhaps even confused by it, before he spoke.

"I believe that would go against my protocols, Mr. Barton. I would turn on the sprinkler system to put the fire out."

Clint felt oddly better. "Thought so."