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It was a relatively q-word shift, a rare occurrence for the crew, until—well—the bell chimed.
The 118 immediately rushed to the scene. It was a partially collapsed building following years of neglected maintenance.
The operation, delicate as it was, was fairly routine: evacuation, checking on the residents, securing the area, making sure everyone was safe…
In short, nothing out of the ordinary for the team.
In fact, they were already on their way back to the station. Everything seemed to have gone smoothly.
Buck and Eddie, as usual, walked side by side, their shoulders brushing against each other every now and then.
“Buck, do you want to come over for dinner at our place after shift?” Eddie asked.
A request that was, too, completely ordinary. It was common for them to spend time together even outside of work hours.
Buck turned toward him distractedly, and didn’t seem to think twice before answering.
“Sure, Ed—“
His sentence remained unfinished.
Not paying attention to where he was stepping, he tripped over something.
“WOH!” he exclaimed, losing his balance.
He fell forward, hitting his head violently against the asphalt.
“BUCK!” Eddie shouted.
Luckily, he was still wearing his helmet, which had absorbed much of the impact and spared him far worse consequences.
But even so, the blow was hard enough to knock him unconscious.
For a few interminable seconds, Buck remained motionless on the ground.
Eddie immediately dropped to his knees beside him.
He pressed his fingers against Buck’s neck, searching for a pulse.
He let out a sigh of relief when he realized Buck was still breathing.
“Buck? Buck, can you hear me?” he asked, his heart still pounding from the scare.
For a few seconds, there was no answer.
Until Buck let out a small groan.
His eyelids fluttered as he struggled to open his eyes.
“…Eddie?” he said.
Eddie didn’t even seem to notice the strange inflection Buck had used to pronounce his name. The relief was too overwhelming for him to register it.
“Yeah, I’m here. Can you hear me?” he asked, while the others, having noticed what had happened, approached them.
Buck stared at him for a few seconds, still completely dazed from the impact.
Then he frowned.
“Why are you looking at me like that, mate?”
Eddie blinked a couple of times, processing the situation.
Hen, who had meanwhile approached them, froze, turning toward Chimney. Chimney looked back at her, equally shocked.
“…What did you just say?” Eddie asked cautiously.
Buck stared at him, confused.
“I asked why are you looking at me like that,”
Then there was a brief pause before he added, “mate.”
Eddie’s eyes widened. He didn’t want to believe what he’d just heard.
He looked at Hen, hoping that all of this was just in his head, but she was equally incredulous.
Buck had just spoken.
With a flawless British accent.
————
The ride to the hospital was downright surreal. Buck remained sitting on the stretcher, categorically refusing to lie down, displaying a decidedly different personality from his usual self.
And not only that—he kept talking nonstop, not shutting up for even a second.
“I mean, look at that highway, Eddie,” Buck said indignantly, shaking his head. “Absolute shambles. In London, a dual carriageway would never be left in such a state.”
No one dared interrupt his speech.
“…And don’t let me start on the rubbish strewn about the pavement. Proper scruffy, if you ask me.”
Ravi, being the little shit he was, couldn’t help himself, teasing him even in such an absurd situation.
“So… I guess… You are not amused, are you?”
“I am utterly unamused, I must say,” Buck agreed, completely oblivious.
Hen smacked Ravi on the shoulder, managing to stop his wicked laugh.
But that mischievous little smile remained firmly plastered across his lips.
“Don’t feed into it, Ravi. He is concussed,” Hen scolded him, as though she were talking to a mischievous child.
“Oh, don’t be silly, Hen. I’m not concussed,” Buck said, still speaking like an irritated Londoner. “Though if I’m being entirely transparent, I’m feeling a touch knackered. A proper cuppa would sort me right out. You wouldn’t happen to have a tin of digestive biscuits laying about in this iron contraption, would you?”
————
At the hospital, he was properly examined, although Hen, ever the keen observer, already had her own theory.
“Foreign Accent Syndrome,” she explained.
Eddie had heard of cases like this, but he’d never witnessed anything like it firsthand.
“A mild head injury can temporarily alter the way the brain controls speech and phonetics,” Hen continued, always extremely professional and clear in her explanation. “But I have to admit, the intonation is so perfect it’s almost frightening. It’s practically a flawless accent.”
“I’ve heard of people who, following a trauma, started speaking a language even though they’d never spoken it before. Is it related?” Harry asked.
“Yes, you could say it’s a case of the same kind of phenomenon.”
Eddie was speechless. He had absolutely no idea how to react to a situation of this magnitude.
And as much as he wanted to say that concern took precedence, unfortunately, the shivers running through his body whenever Buck spoke in perfect British English didn’t lie.
He was mesmerized by it.
He knew he was hopelessly in love with Buck, and therefore every single one of his characteristics was incredibly attractive to Eddie, but he’d just discovered that one particular quality he’d never had the chance to dwell on before.
And he felt an overwhelming sense of shame and disgust toward himself.
I mean, his best friend was suffering, and the only thing he could think about was how badly he wanted to kiss him senseless.
————
“Well, Evan,” Dr. Kim said, desperately fighting back a smile as he turned off his penlight.
“The good news is that your preliminary scans show no intracranial bleeding or skull fractures. You have a mild concussion. As for the accent… it’s a temporary neuro-linguistic response to the impact. As the minor swelling subsides over the next forty-eight hours, your normal speech patterns should return.”
“My ‘normal’ speech?” Buck raised an eyebrow, looking offended.
“Doctor, I am speaking the King’s English! It is the rest of this town that speaks like they’ve got a mouthful of marbles!” Buck exclaimed, still ‘utterly unamused’.
“Buck, you grew up in Pennsylvania,” Chimney pointed out, and he was really ‘amused’.
The doctor shined a penlight into Buck’s eyes.
“Ouch, a bit heavy-handed, mate!” he complained, pulling slightly away from her. “Look. If we could wrap this up, I’d deeply appreciate it.”
Even the doctor seemed ‘amused’ by this absurd situation.
“I had a minor altercation with the pavement. But I assure you, my cranium is quite intact. There’s no need to make such an insufferable fuss.”
————
“Right then,” Buck said, clapping his hands together briskly. “Who’s up for a game of cricket after shift? Or perhaps a nice stroll down to the pub for a pint and a Sunday roast? I’m absolutely famished.”
Buck and the team, once the doctor had given him the all-clear, were making their way toward the stairs, leaving the hospital.
“Could we please pop into the lift on our way back?”
“Elevator,” Harry corrected him, annoyed.
“No, Harry. I’m quite sure the right word must be lift in this situation,” Buck replied, absolutely direct and monotone.
————
Buck was taken off duty, and Eddie went with him, deciding to take him back to his own house to keep an eye on him while he recovered.
When they walked through the front door, Christopher was sitting on the couch with his laptop.
He looked up, his eyes immediately landing on the white butterfly bandage plastered across Buck’s forehead.
“Buck! Are you okay?” Christopher asked, setting his computer aside.
“Dad texted me that you took a big hit on your head.”
Buck smoothed down his shirt, walking into the living room with an effortlessly polished posture. “Ah, Christopher! My dear chap, don’t worry your pretty little head. Just a minor scuffle with the asphalt, nothing a sturdy lad like me can’t handle.”
Christopher blinked. He looked at Buck, then slowly turned his head to stare at his dad.
“Why does he sound like Harry Potter?”
“Foreign Accent Syndrome,” Eddie explained, leaning against the doorframe with a fond smirk.
“He fell, hit his bonce, and now he thinks he’s a Lord,” Eddie said, imitating the worst British accent imaginable.
Buck grimaced.
“I do not think I am a Lord, Eddie,” Buck corrected briskly, waving a dismissive hand. “I am simply a man of refined tastes stuck in a city that doesn’t understand the concept of proper tea. Now, Chris, my mate, tell me your old man isn’t planning on making burgers tonight. My stomach is shouting for a proper shepherd’s pie, or at the very least, a decent plate of fish and chips with mushy peas!”
Eddie sighed. Nevertheless, he headed into the kitchen, hoping to whip up some sort of recipe that would suit British Buck’s tastes.
“Could I switch on the TV while you cook indeed? I would love to watch a bit of Doctor Who while I wait,” Buck called from the living room.
“Sorry, Buck. You have a concussion. No TV for at least a couple of days. Doctor’s orders.”
Buck let out a few British-sounding complaints that Eddie couldn’t quite make out from where he was standing.
“Can I at least have a bo-hole of wo-ha, please?”
“A what?”Eddie returned to the living room to understand what Buck was asking for.
“A bo-hole of wo-ha,” Buck repeated.
“I have absolutely no idea what you’re saying, Buck.” Eddie smiled, amused.
“Oh, for God’s sake!” Buck exclaimed, walking over to the fridge and grabbing himself a bottle of water.
“Oh! You meant a bottle of water!”
“That’s what I said! A bo-hole of wo-ha.”
“Oh yeah, potato potato, tomato tomato,” Eddie muttered under his breath.
————
Eddie had let Buck have his bed that night, making sure he’d taken his medication.
The next morning, he woke up first, ready to make coffee.
While he was busy in the kitchen, he heard soft footsteps behind him.
“Good morning, Eddie.”
Oh. That didn’t sound British at all.
“Buck? Can you say something else, please?” Eddie asked, turning toward him, watching him closely.
“What? Why? Is something wrong? Oh, my head is killing me!” Buck complained.
But the accent was definitely gone. Buck was back. No more biscuits, or lift, or mate… Just normal, American Buck.
“Yesterday you were talking like a British lord from the 1800s,” Eddie said under his breath, but Buck didn’t hear him, too focused on his headache.
“Dude, I had the weirdest fucking dream last night. I dreamt I was yelling at you about deep frying potatoes and demanding Earl Grey tea.”
“Yeah… about that,” Eddie said, letting out a quiet sigh as he poured Buck a cup of coffee and slid it across the counter. “It wasn’t a dream, man. You had Foreign Accent Syndrome from the hit on your helmet. You spent the entire evening sounding like you were next in line for the British throne.”
Buck froze, his coffee mug halfway to his mouth. “Wait, what? Seriously? I was actually talking like that?”
“Oh, absolutely,” Eddie chuckled softly, leaning back against the counter and looking down at his own mug to hide the tinge of disappointment in his eyes. “You called the trunk of the car a boot, you called the elevator ‘lift’, and you insulted my cooking like five times. Christopher thought you were Harry Potter.”
“Oh no. Please tell me you’re joking.” Buck groaned, bringing his hands to his head in despair.
“Honestly, Buck… it was pretty impressive. Your accent was flawless. Perfect Received Pronunciation.”
Buck looked up through his fingers, catching the subtle shift in Eddie’s gaze.
The way Eddie’s eyes lingered on his lips just a fraction of a second longer than usual. A cheeky, knowing smile began to creep onto Buck’s face.
“Wait a second…” Buck leaned forward over the island, his blue eyes sparkling with sudden mischief. “Are you telling me you actually liked it?”
«What? No!» Eddie replied, suddenly defensive.
«Oh, you absolutely did,» Buck said smugly. As though all the complaints from moments before had been completely forgotten.
“I’m relieved my best friend doesn’t have permanent brain damage, Buck,” Eddie countered, though a flush crept up his neck, betraying him entirely.
Thousands emotions passed through Buck’s eyes: tenderness, confusion… Then understanding, and finally mischief.
When he spoke again, the crisp, immaculate London accent returned with absolute, terrifying precision.
“Well, my dear Eddie,” Buck said smoothly, his voice dropping into that rich, velvet British cadence that sent a sharp shiver straight down Eddie’s spine. “If it pleases you so much, I suppose I could keep it up for a cuppa or two, mate.”
Eddie’s breath caught. His jaw dropped, his pupils dilating. His body completely at the mercy of the waves of arousal flooding through him.
Buck broke character immediately, bursting into a loud, triumphant laugh at Eddie’s utterly undone reaction. “Ha! Gotcha! I did a play in middle school, Eddie! I can fake it whenever I want!”
Eddie stared at him for a few moments, his heart pounding desperately against his ribcage.
He wanted to grab Buck and cage him in his arms, kissing him senseless against the kitchen counter.
And he didn’t hold back.