A/N: Hello, new fandom! *nervous wave* (I know, guys. I'm branching out. It's weird to me, too.) This actually originated in a conversation with AwesomeEmuGirl – so thank you for the inspiration, buddy! Believe it or not, I wrote this originally intending for pure crack. Then it got vaguely serious at times, which surprised me. Anyway, there's a little implied Clint/Natasha in here, and definitely Tony/Pepper because it fit the story. Enjoy!

Disclaimer: *sighs* Yeah, yeah… Don't own Avengers, either…

It wasn't Clint's fault. Not really, anyway. Sometimes, in bed at night, he'd repeat that little mantra to himself.

None of it was his fault.

He'd never asked to be on such a weird team of superheroes, or to watch Dora the Explorer with Hulk (it calmed the big guy down, okay?), or to never be able to bake a single batch of brownies without every damn one being eaten within four minutes. (Yes, yes he did bake brownies. They were very delicious. If anyone had a problem with that, then he knew several extremely creative ways to make that problem go away.) Yup, Clint hadn't asked for any of it. Most of all, however, not once had he asked to live with Tony Stark.

And that was why absolutely none of it was his fault.

Mornings were some of the best moments at Avengers tower. It was in those very early hours of dawn that the day's shenanigans had yet to begin, the air would feel crisp and full of potential, and that a quiet blanket of rare tranquility would settle over the tower.

Clint and Natasha had never been ones to get up at quite such a ridiculous hour, but both had quietly started to do so after moving into the tower. It was nice. Really, it was the only moment during the entire day where the two could be enveloped in unassuming companionable silence. Most days they'd run into Steve, as he was the only other person crazy enough to be awake at such an hour. It wasn't bad, though. Clint actually liked their quiet little morning routine. Sometimes they would lean against the kitchen appliances and sip their coffees.

And then this morning had to come along. It had seemed so innocent.

On this particular morning Steve was nowhere in sight when Clint stumbled into the kitchen yawning. Probably out for a run or something motivated like that. Hell if Clint knew. And then, like clockwork, a few moments later Natasha wandered in. She always came in to the kitchen at the exact same time. She even gave military precision to such a small detail. And yet, it never ceased to amaze Clint how she could still look so badass with rumpled hair and a one-size-too-small Hello Kitty sleep shirt. Natasha Romanoff was a wonder of nature; she really was.

"Morning," she yawned, starting up the coffee.

"Hey," he responded, mouth quirking into a lazy smile. She smiled back at him - just a little bit - and Clint felt at peace with the morning and their solitude and her freaking Hello Kitty shirt as he reached into the fridge for the Hazelnut creamer. He was pretty sure she never showed anyone else that particular smile. Then again, maybe he was just another hopeless bastard in the arms of the Black Widow. He didn't think so, though. The soft morning air seemed to agree with him.

Clint's attention was on starting up the toast (because God knows there'd be enough hungry Avengers in this place in a few hours) when Pepper Pots walked through the kitchen archway. He and Natasha exchanged a look of surprise as they both subconsciously straightened ever so slightly.

It was all fine and dandy for them to be up this early, but for someone else it was weird.

"Hey," he said in his best cool agent nod of acknowledgement. Natasha did her whole silently-acknowledge-your-presence thing in a way that Clint couldn't master in front of a mirror if he tried. (Which he may or may not have already done. On multiple occasions. Ahem.)

Pepper smiled at the two of them as she reached for a mug. The one with the Iron Man design, of course. "Hey guys." There was a moment of silence broken only by the trickling of freshly brewed coffee into Pepper's mug. Then; "I didn't expect anyone to be up this early."

Clint liked how she didn't ask them why they were up. And he liked even more how she didn't even touch on why she wasup this early. (If it involved Tony Stark, then he didn't really want to know.) Some things, especially in this house, were better left a mystery. Pepper seemed to have a pretty impressive understanding of that, which made her cool. For lack of something better to do, Clint was watching Natasha pour herself some coffee and beginning to think about what he was going to tell Fury about the whole "my top secret report turned into a banana – no, I swear!" thing. He had zero idea what had happened. All he could think was that maybe magic was involved, which would be fun to see Fury's reaction to. It wasn't such a bad thought process to go down as it was a slightly amusing one.

So he was understandably surprised when a thing popped out of literally nowhere and started making beeping noises and shit it was looking right at him.

There's something about living for so many years on edge that makes you have the most laser sharp reaction time in the world. In an instant, Clint's coffee-starved mind suddenly went into overdrive. His focus narrowed to nothing but the situation at hand. He did not have enough time to fully catalog the threat. All he knew was that something was coming straight towards him. The thing, whatever it was, was making weird noises. The thing was not going to be making weird noises much longer.

Grabbing the nearest object at hand, which turned out to be a plate, Clint hit the thing as hard as he could. That was very hard.

Brrp! Beep!

And okay, in retrospect maybe it wouldn't have hurt to have taken that time to reassess the situation. But retrospect would come later. In that early morning moment the thing was still making sound. That meant it was still a threat to him and the people around him. He hit it again. And again. And again. He smashed the thing into oblivion. (Maybe living with Bruce Banner was having a negative influence on him.) He kept on going until the thing was nothing but a tangled mess of sparking wires on the floor. All those paranoid years working with people who were trying to kill him came tumbling out into the suddenly very hot morning with nothing to keep him company but the paroxysms of sudden rage and fear. Adrenaline rushed through him. He kept on going until he realized that someone was screaming. Pepper, it was Pepper. And she was screaming...at him?

"Dan! You killed Dan!"

Clint blinked slowly. "...Dan?"

That only seemed to enrage Pepper more. And she had already seemed pretty pissed. "Clint Barton, how could you?! Dan was just minding his own business, and you-" Clint watched her mouth move, shocked. Whoa. Whoa. She looked close to tears now. Not good. Definitely not good.

"Poor little Dan..." Pepper sniffled as she trailed off. She actually sniffled. It was all a very bewildered Clint could do to stare at her like an idiot. It was too early in the morning for all of this, it really was. Natasha, however, seemed to have no such limitations.

"And how was he supposed to know that?!" Her eyes flashed. "With our work experience, we're trained to neutralize first and ask questions later."

It was true, Clint thought. Damn thing, jumping out at him like that. What was he supposed to do?

Pepper took a deep breath, seemed to regain her composure, and looked at the two agents in an anger that was as scary as it was calm.

"Fine," she said oh-so-composedly, carefully picking up the pieces of... Dan, or whatever it was called. (A robot, maybe?) "But this isn't over." And she turned to Clint with such deep anger flashing in her eyes that it honest to God terrified him before he reminded himself that he shouldn't be terrified of such things. Her last words were simultaneously fire and ice. "And, Clint Barton, you will regret this."

He and Natasha locked eyes for a single moment, and the message silently conveyed was quite neutral: well shit.

And with that, the CEO of Stark Industries stalked away.

The owner of Stark Industries, meanwhile, was actually just about to go to bed for the night. (Or morning, whatever.) As JARVIS was offline at the moment for some repairs, no one was around to tell him the exact time. That was fine with him, though. He felt like a kid in a candy shop. Many would say that he was.

Oh man, Bruce was going to love this.

His hands ran over the enlarged holographic chip on the table beneath him almost subconsciously, making tiny tweaks and running over the calculations once again. Theoretically, the chip should function as a quantum computer. With this little baby, calculations could be run that all of the world's computers wouldn't be able to do in ten years. He was staring at the future. As usual. Obviously a few more adjustments were needed, but this was huge.

"Turn it on," he said gleefully to the empty interface that took over for JARVIS when he was out.

The interface responded blankly. "Turning on project 'Fuck Yeah.'"

Tony smirked at the name. He'd really just named it that because he enjoyed hearing JARVIS curse a little bit too much. Okay, maybe he was slightly immature. Whatever. The little chip, meanwhile, made a couple of pings, started to smoke, and that's when things went downhill.

BOOM.

Silence filled the lab as he looked down at his smoking creation. He was definitely on the right track, and that was all that really mattered. He'd have it soon. "Did ya see that, interface?" Tony grinned. "Daddy's blowing up electrons."

The interface didn't respond. This was why he liked JARVIS.

Feeling extremely satisfied with himself regardless, Tony Stark finally sat back and took a long drink of scotch. This was awesome.

Pepper Pots approaching.

The messagedashed across the hologram, effectively interrupting his reverie. Typical. Of course the scotch-drinking was when Pepper had to come in, not the genius-ing. He swung around in his chair, adopted his patented smirk (literally – he'd had it patented), and waited the two seconds for the door to swing open. He swung around in his chair ready for the world.

But he wasn't excepting the sight that greeted him.

His beautiful Pepper, hair still sticking up from her sleep and holding a cup of coffee she looked like she'd completely forgotten about, looked terrible. It was all in her face – the worst mixture of anger and pure devastation. Upon looking at her, Tony's own face instantly softened. Although he had no way of knowing it, Pepper would always love him for that.

Despite the endless sarcasm he was always happy to supply, Tony never failed to be there when he needed to be. He was good at telling the difference. And now was one of those times, apparently.

Quantum computers forgotten in an instant, he crossed the space between them, pulled Pepper into his arms, and pressed a kiss into her hair. He was even more alarmed to hear her begin to cry.

"What's wrong?" Tony managed, pulling Pepper even closer and making small circles on her back.

Pepper only shook her head in Tony's embrace. "Is... Oh god. Can JARVIS hear us right now?"

Tony made a negative sounding noise into Pepper's hair. "No, he's just finishing up with some repairs."

Pepper nodded as though steeling herself for something, took a deep, shaky breath and finally looked up at him. "Tony. It's Dan."

Tony got very quiet. He had a lot of robots. As in a shit-ton of robots. But Dan was special. Completely and utterly useless for everything except his endearing qualities, he was akin to a robot pet. He was this weird little derp that basically just made boop noises. And he and Pepper loved that thing like it was their child. It practically was, considering that it was one of the few things that they'd actually made together.

"What about him?"

Pepper was still looking at him. He realized that her hands had tightened around him in a comforting way. "He's… he's dead, Tony." And sure enough, one of her hands came up from Tony's back to reveal the pathetically crushed tangled mess of wires that had once been Dan the Derp.

Tony didn't bother asking how. He could clearly see the poor little thing had been crushed. He was an Avenger; he only had one question.

"Who?"

Pepper's tear-filled eyes suddenly steeled as they finally broke apart from each other. "Barton."

There was a long moment of silence. Then Tony filled the room with a stream of expletives, kicking a corner of the wall because it was expensive and immediately regretting it because it hurt. Pepper seemed to be feeling similarly, but was presumably better at handling her grief at the robot's untimely demise.

Barton. Of course it had been Barton.

Tony slowed down, and was quiet for a long moment before finally turning back to Pepper. "We have to tell JARVIS."

She took a deep breath. Neither of them wanted to do this. "I know."

This was not going to be fun.

Tony allowed himself one shared breath with Pepper before powering up JARVIS once again. The AI's voice came smoothly through the lab system; "Repair installment complete." There was the slightest of pauses as he directed his next statement towards his creator. "Sir, I feel obligated to inform you that you have now been awake for forty-three hours."

It was a mark of how serious the situation was that Pepper only sent a half-hearted glare in Tony's direction. And even then, it was more for normalcy's sake then for reprobating her boyfriend. Tony, meanwhile, let out a little huff. "Whatever you say, buddy." They were both just prolonging the inevitable, though, and they knew it.

"So how are the repairs, JARVIS?" Tony asked after a moment, wishing he didn't have to tell him about this. If Dan was his and Pepper's pet, then JARVIS was the kid that freaking adored the pet. Tony had definitely caught the AI teaching him tricks a few days ago. And no, Tony wasn't crazy. He just had a family of robots. (And Pepper. She was there, too.)

"Nothing out of the ordinary, sir." Came the reply, and he definitely sounded a little confused now. Most people wouldn't be so worried about breaking the news to an AI. But Tony Stark wasn't most people, and JARVIS wasn't just any AI.

"JARVIS," Tony said slowly. Pepper came up and put her hand on Tony's shoulder in silent support. "There's something I have to tell you."

That got his attention. As if Tony hadn't had it before.

"You missed something while you were out." He noticed his AI was rapidly running scans on his surroundings – a nervous habit. Tony looked down at the glass of scotch that was miraculously still undisturbed, his own nervous habit, and took a breath. He'd never been one for prolonging anything. Might as well get it over with.

"Barton killed Dan."

Silence.

"We're so sorry, JARVIS." That was Pepper. "And he's going to pay for this."

More silence. He could see through the AI's coding that he was scanning the house's systems for the now nonexistent bot.

"JARVIS, buddy. Talk to me."

"…Sir, I don't think I like emotions."

And there went the heartbreaker. Pepper glared at Tony, as if this was all his fault. 'In some corner of the universe, it probably was'; that was Tony's current running theory. He had given him the emotions chip, after all.

Emotions were complicated.

All Tony could do was let out one humorless laugh. It sounded more like a bubbling cough. "Me neither."

"I will… inform the others." Damn Clint Barton. There was going to be a lot of very upset machinery in this house.

Tony nodded mutely. Across the room, Dummy started to whir unhappily as he got the update.

In fact, across the entire tower every piece of technology Tony had designed made some sort of sound – it was a call to arms. Signals were sent rapidly pinging back and forth all throughout the tower, as though they were all communicating together. They weren't merely upset by the fall of their brother; they were very angry.

And this was going to be war.

Clint Barton had just become technological enemy number one.

The call to arms of the machines made quite a sight to behold and an unsuspecting super soldier, who was just walking through the door from his morning run, jumped nearly in to the next room. This century could be really creepy sometimes.

Technology was definitely not like this in the 40's.

Meanwhile, far below Steve, there was another moment of silence in the lab. "Shall I prepare funeral arrangements, sir?"

Tony nodded. "Yeah. Import the Japanese Imperial Gardens or something nice like that."

"Yes, sir."

"Oh, and JARVIS?" Tony glared into his nearly empty glass of scotch. Because maybe it was childish what was about to come out of his mouth, but he didn't really care. This was war now. "Barton isn't invited."

"Do you have the slightest idea of what's going on?" Steve whispered to Thor. The god shook his head with equal confusion.

"I do not. It would seem that one of the man of iron's metal friends have fallen, but beyond that I am unsure as to what we are doing here."

Steve nodded; very glad that at least someone was on the same page as him. Wasn't technology replaceable…? And why did everything in the tower keep on making weird noises? When they had been informed that there was a funeral taking place within the tower for Tony's robot, Steve had initially thought that it was a joke. But it wasn't. Apparently Tony Stark was just very, very attached to his technology.

What a strange person. Rather like his father.

What mostly confused Steve, though, was that it seemed that if Tony had made this thing, then he could fix it. From what he knew of the man, he'd never encountered a problem that he couldn't create the solution for with enough tools.

And he had tools.

He had lots of robot-making tools.

Steve was so done. He really was. And yet, Tony was very clearly genuinely upset.

"Do you think we should go over there?" Steve asked, gesturing towards where Tony, Pepper, and Bruce Banner were all mourning.

"I do not know," Thor said slowly.

Bruce had seemed genuinely upset when he had come to the… makeshift funeral, if that's what it was. Steve really wasn't sure. The scientist had approached Tony and Pepper as they were standing up front (next to one of those enlarged posters that were supposed to show a headshot of the dead person, except this one showed a robot?) and had shared in hugs all around. They were still locked in a heartfelt discussion now, by the looks of it.

This robot funeral was made even more confusing by the fact that it was taking place in a large room in the tower, absolutely covered in oriental flowers. Everything from the ceiling to the walls was quite invisible under the massive amounts of flora. Garlands hung from the ceiling in ridiculously elaborate spirals.

And no one was there except for Steve, Thor, Bruce, Pepper, and Tony Stark. It was an odd gathering in a very odd place.

"All right," Pepper said then, stepping away slightly from Tony to be made more audible to the crowd of four. She was dressed entirely in black. "I think it's about time to start."

Steve and Thor exchanged a glance akin to "I'll do it if you do it, bro" and slowly took their seats. Some things in life just have to be done.

"Yeah," Bruce mumbled into the silence. "I guess I'll start." He walked up to the podium (why was there a podium for a group of only five people?) and began to speak. "I, um, didn't know Dan very well. Not as well as others knew him, anyway." He cleared his throat. "But for the short time that I did know him, he was such a strong presence in the lab. He was always so bright and cheerful, and filled with an energy that seemed so youthful… It's a terrible tragedy that he had to be taken from us at such a young age. Dan deserved more than that." The doctor stopped at that, seeming too overcome with grief to continue, and stepped down from the podium.

There was an uncomfortable silence as Bruce took his seat. Tony and Pepper weren't moving. Finally, Steve and Thor looked at each other. Oh.

Oh no.

They weren't expected to get up there, too, were they…?

Apparently so.

Thor wasn't moving. Evidently Steve was going to have to take one for the team.

He stood up slowly and made his way to the podium that he still didn't understand. It seemed ridiculous with such a small amount of people. Then again, this entire funeral seemed ridiculous to Steve.

Then again, Tony Stark was ridiculous to Steve.

"Um." He began eloquently. They were all looking at him expectantly and he had absolutely nothing to say. Why had he even been invited to this weird thing in the first place?! But Steve took a deep internal breath. He could do this. He'd definitely done worse.

There was a word for what he was about to do. It was bullshitting.

"Dan… Oh, Dan. I don't even know what to say about Dan." He noticed Pepper nodding, teary. "He was… a robot. Named Dan. And he meant a lot to people. I, um, didn't know him very well." Not at all. He hadn't known him at all. Okay, he needed a new approach. "But we don't always have the answers as to why someone… or thing… had to die. Sometimes it doesn't make sense. Sometimes a lot of things don't make sense..." Like this funeral. "But at the end of the day we've got to just keep on going, because that is what they would want us to do. We can't ever give up."

"That's beautiful, Steve," Pepper said, wiping away a tear.

Steve nodded to himself, as though he had any idea of what had just come out of his mouth, and returned to his seat. At least it was over.

Thor wandered up to the podium after a moment, looking very nervous. Steve could emphasize.

"It is always tragic when great ones fall. The metal friend will be remembered in our hearts, in our battles, and in our songs." Thor nodded, looking a little lost as to where to go from there, but bravely continued. Steve thought it was quite impressive.

"On Asgard we would hold a great feast for the metal friend, because those who knew him saw him as a brave and true friend."

Thor, unlike Steve, was not one to ramble. He had said all that he could think of to say. And so he slowly retreated back to his chair. The two exchanged a look that said it all. They had been through war, and they had bonded for it.

Pepper, who had previously been leaning into a misty eyed Tony, stood up shakily. "Dan meant so much… so much to us all. And he was so young. He was murdered in cold blood. And… and it means so much that all of you could come…" She shook her head at that, clearly too overcome to continue, and returned to her seat.

At this point, Steve took the liberty of thinking to himself, "okay, that was really weird. But it's over now, right?" Wrong. Always wrong. Nothing was ever over.

The voice of JARVIS filled the room. "I would like to say a few words as well." Okay, this was getting downright ridiculous. Absolutely no one was sane here. Except Thor.

"Dan always filled the circuits with such warmth. There will… always be a place reserved for him in the wiring of Avengers tower. The circuits seem so lonely without him."

When Tony stood up, Steve was presented with horrific visions of the man telling his robot's entire life story. But the super soldier somehow kept a straight and somber face. At this point, he was about seventy percent sure that it would be rude not to.

"I made Dan." Tony's mouth quirked slightly. "Pepper helped." He took a breath. "He was such a little derp. Literally all he ever did was make booping noises. But he was my derp. He was my damn derp. And JARVIS's, and Pepper's. And I don't like it when things get taken away from me. Like Pepper said, Dan was clearly murdered. You can all see his mangled corpse."

He stood up a little taller, and squared his jaw. He looked confident and strong, and Steve saw Iron Man in a sudden burst. It was strange, how they all had these double-personas and yet didn't really at all.

For a moment he looked like a true hero.

And then he went right back to looking like Tony Stark. "I have no idea why it happened. All I know is that Clint Barton is a complete asshole." He nodded at the truth of his own words. "Thank you all."

At this point there was some sad swelling music. "The Arms of the Angel" was played and Steve had to fight very hard not to roll his eyes. Then, it was over.

And it was all Steve could do to sit in his chair and wonder what on earth had just happened. There was a line where the guests could offer their condolences. Bruce said something about 'what a beautiful ceremony' and drifted back to his lab. Thor just kind of made a compassionate looking nod and booked it out of there. And then there was Steve.

He got up and made his way over to Tony. Pepper, who had previously been standing next to the billionaire, seemed to think that some important and sentimental conversation was about to go down because she squeezed Tony's arm and made an excuse to leave.

That just left him and Tony.

Steve just looked at him for quite some time, (he seemed quite content to stare back, which was sort of creepy) and finally figured he was just going to go ahead and ask him. "Stark, what was that all about?"

"What, the funeral for Dan?"

"Yes."

"I was honoring my fallen comrade. Obviously."

"Yeah, I got that part, but… Can't you just make a new Dan?"

Tony looked mildly offended. "Of course I can, Capsicle." Steve deadpanned. This man was unbelievable. "And I will, of course."

"Then why did you have this whole funeral?!"

"Mainly because Clint Barton is an asshole. And that needed a ceremony so long ago."

Despite everything, Steve felt the slightest of grins coming on. What a strange person. "I'll see you later, Tony."

The genius nodded as Steve turned to go. He was almost to the door when he called out, "But seriously, though, Rogers. No touching my stuff."

Steve finally got it, though. He was pretty sure that it was more than that. Tony had a family he'd made for himself. It ran deep. That much, at least, Steve could understand. Steve just shook his head wordlessly as he passed through the door.

For the first few days Clint thought that he was just being paranoid, thinking that all of Tony Stark's technology suddenly hated him. It was little things, like his toast always coming up burnt, or the lights refusing to stay on. But after a week, he knew. He knew when his coffee suddenly spurted out of the machine and Tony had the most knowing smirk on his face.

He also knew when he was in the shower and the water all of a sudden went freezing.

And he was reminded again when he was locked in his room for a full day and JARVIS icily 'apologized' for the 'security glitch'.

And again at three a.m. when 'Star Spangled Man With A Plan' blared on repeat through every speaker he had in his room, and some that he hadn't even known that he'd had. The next morning, JARVIS once again apologized for the glitch.

But Clint wasn't an idiot. JARVIS didn't have glitches.

This was machine torture. In Clint's opinion, it was cruel and unusual punishment. He'd lament to Nat, and she'd just roll her eyes.

But Clint knew.

And JARVIS knew.

And so did the freaking toaster.

It hadn't been Clint's fault. It really hadn't been. He'd tried telling Tony that, and Pepper, and mostly JARVIS, but nothing seemed to change their perception that he was the world's biggest ass. And he couldn't even get Steve to complain about the alleged funeral that Tony had held. Jeez they were a messed up team.

Well. Maybe it takes one to know one.

And maybe, just until he could make a truce with the toaster, that'd have to be enough.

A/N: I don't hate Clint, I swear! XD Tony's just really serious about his robots. Anyway, tell me what you thought! As usual, I'm nervous about posting things in a new place.