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Buck had been barely 18 when he got handed a flyer for the Navy SEALs at his high-school graduation.
His dad had wanted him to become something successful, like a lawyer, but Buck knew from the beginning that that just wasn't what he was meant to do.
Since he had been willing to do anything to escape his parents, he enlisted for Navy SEAL tryouts the very next day.
A year later Buck had been assigned a SEALS team, finally having finished his training.
Buck had grown to love his team as if they were his family, well in some way they had actually been that.
There was Madison, the brains of the team. If you needed a plan they were your guy.
Then there was Williams, the gun specialist. Williams always knew what weapon you needed to use when and why. He was also really skilled with most low to mid-range weapons.
Buck was the sniper of the team. Even from his first day training with the weapons his instructors had seen that he was good with long range weapons, so he specialized in it.
And in the spot of team leader you would find Anders. She was the best leader Buck could've wished for. She was nice but also made sure that all of them returned from mission.
They had been a team for a year now and every one of them considered each other family. Or at least they had considered each other family.
They couldn't really do that anymore though because they were all dead. Well all but Buck, Buck just wished he was.
Their mission had started as something simple and easy. All of them were supposed to go in, save a few hostages and get out again with as little altercations as possible.
But their enemies must've somehow gotten word of their mission because when the team had shown up the hostages had been dead on the floor and the team had been immediately shot at.
Buck had just felt an intense pain in his shoulder and then his leg and suddenly everything was black. That was the last thing he remembered before he woke up here.
Speaking of here, Buck didn't know where the fuck he was. The only thing Buck did know was that his team was dead, seeing as his captors had spread their corpses right in front of Buck.
Buck couldn't do anything but stare at his family's dead bodies.
Buck was so lost in mourning that he didn't notice that the door to the little room opened. A man walked in with a knife. Buck only realized when he felt the knife at his throat.
Buck tried not to breathe or give the man any reason to just slit his throat. But the man only stood there with the knife at Buck throat, seemingly waiting for someone.
That someone walked into the room about 57 seconds later, Buck counted as he had learned. Every info you can gather in captivity is important info and could be lifesaving.
As the second man, who was clearly in charge here, came to a halt in from of Buck, he began to speak.
"So you're one of those Navy SEALs, huh? From hearing you guys seemed impressive but I guess I was wrong" at that last part the man smirked and spat on Ander's corpse.
Buck tried not to let anything show but he was filled with anger, despair and anxiety. But to his luck, or demise, the man didn't say anything else, he just turned around and left.
But then Buck's world got Black once again, he got blindfolded. The man who had the knife at his throat started moving and moved Buck along with him.
They took a lot of turns and Buck tried to memorize them. Left, left, right, left, right, right, stop. Then simultaneously a few things happened. Buck heard a door open, the knife got lowered, Buck got handcuffed and then he got pushed and the door got closed.
He was now alone, still blindfolded in a new room. Well, maybe not completely alone.
"Who are you? What are you doing here?" Asked a voice, unlike anything Buck had heard before. But the voice didn't sound like one of his captors, but more like the voice of a fellow captive.
"Hi, I got captured, just like you from what I'm guessing" Buck said, not trusting this new voice just yet.
"Oh well, then I guess welcome to the dark room as I like to call it. There's a camera in the top corner but they can't hear us through it. Oh also I’m Eddie Diaz, Field medic" The stranger, Eddie Diaz, said.
"How do you know they can't hear us? I'm Evan Buckley, Navy SEALs" Why he told Eddie who he is he didn't know, but somehow he trusted him already which went against all the principles the SEALS taught him.
"I saw the cameras once when they forgot to blindfold me and I had seen the model before. You're a SEAL? How'd you end up here?"
Buck thought about it for a second, if he should answer or not. This "Eddie Diaz" could still very much be one of his captors trying to get him to talk but he honestly doesn't think so.
"I was on a mission with my team, but we got bad Intel or something because when we arrived we walked right into an ambush. They killed my whole team except for me, How did you land here?"
Eddie Diaz didn't answer for a bit which gave Buck time to think about their, admittedly shitty, situation. How were they supposed to get out of here?
"I was on a helicopter with my team, transporting a wounded soldier. We got shot down. I tried to save them all but in the end they got to us. I'm the only survivor."
Buck could hear the sadness in Eddie's voice. If he had to guess, he would say that Eddie's team had been a family for him too.
They were quiet for a while after this, processing the new info's they learned about each other. Then Eddie started to speak again.
"I've been here for 2 weeks now and so gar every day has been the same. They take you out of the room once a day to torture you for information. After you're being put here again. So far I haven't seen any way I could escape but together it may be possible."
Buck had to process this. 2 weeks? Eddie must've felt so alone and hopeless. He couldn't even imagine what that must've been like.
"I hope so, I don't wanna be in here for the rest of my life" the 'however long it might be' was unspoken but there "but we got each other now and I believe we'll get out of here Diaz." Even though he didn’t believe himself, he hoped that at least Eddie believed his words.
"You can call me Eddie, man. Don't gotta be so formal. If I got the times right they won't come back for another few hours, why don't we just talk? I haven’t had real human interactions in a while."
And if Buck could do one thing, it was talking and so he did. They talked about everything and nothing, jumping around between topics.
At first they talked about their families, Buck learnt Eddie had a freshly divorced ex-wife and a son, but soon after it was just random topics had researched on one of his research nights where he couldn't sleep.
The great thing about Eddie was that he seemed interested in literally everything Buck told him, be it him taking about his sister or why red haired people burn easier in the sun.
Buck was just about to start talking about how important bees are for the environment when he heard the door opening. Then he was yanked upwards by his handcuffs and brought into a different room where he was rudely put on a very uncomfortable stool.
His blindfold got removed and he looked around. There was nothing in the room except for him, the stool he was sat on, a guard at the door and the same man who talked to him earlier in front of him.
The anger came back all at once. This man was most likely responsible for killing his family, he would make him pay. But he couldn't just yet as he was still handcuffed and still didn't know where he was. He hopped the man would let something slide but for that he'd need to be in charge of the conversation.
"Why am I here? What do you want from me?" The man only smirked, something Buck has already started to despise.
"Well, Well, right to business are we? If you want it like this: we are going to torture you and the army man until you give us all the info's we want from you about your operations."
Okay to be fair Buck hadn't expected anything different but it still made his heart beat a lot faster. Sure, he had had training about what to do when one found themselves in this situation, but actually living it was a different kind of hell.
But he knew he couldn’t tell his captors what they wanted to know. That was one thing that made him a good SEAL, the way he could gracefully handle himself under pressure. So he told them nothing.
They tortured him for what felt like days, even though it was more realistic to be a few hours. But even after all the torture, Buck did not tell them a single word, which really seemed to piss them off, good.
When they realized they wouldn’t break him today, they put the blindfold back on and brought him back to the “dark room”. As shitty as this might sound, Buck was happy that he wasn’t completely alone.
But when he got there the room was empty, not that he could see it anyway. But the presence of Eddie, that he had gotten used to over these few shared hours, was nowhere to be found.
But before Buck could imagine very scenario possible what had happened to Eddie, the door opened and someone was thrown into the room.
“Evan, you here?” asked Eddie’s voice, thankfully. Buck has only known this man for a few hours but he would already sacrifice himself if that would help Eddie get out of here.
“Yeah, I’m here and I’m okay. You okay?” He desperately hoped that he was, but you could never be sure. Eddie had been here for 2 weeks already, he didn’t even want to imagine the damage they might’ve done to him.
“Yeah I’m okay too. We should sleep, we need all the energy we can get.” And that’s what they did. The floor was uncomfortable, hard and wet but Buck still managed to fall asleep in minutes.
When he awoke the next day, everything ached. His muscles were stiff and his wounds that were inflicted on him yesterday were throbbing.
The door opened and suddenly, instead of being forced to stand up, someone grabbed his chin and forced his mouth open, immediately pouring a few sips of water down his throat. Without giving him much of a break or time to swallow there was a bunch of bread being stuffed into his mouth.
Just as quickly as they came, they were gone again. All that was left were the sounds of Eddie and Buck trying not to choke on their not really enjoyable breakfast. As soon as they both calmed down, they began talking like the day before until they were taken for torture.
The days blended into each other after that, every day the same. Wake up, “breakfast”, talking, torture, sleep. They never talked during their torture, but for that they talked with each other a thousand times more.
No matter how much time has by now been spent on them just talking, they never ran out of topics to talk about with each other and they quickly became each other’s best friends.
This specific day, 58 days from Buck’s initial capture, had started off like the rest of their days. They woke up, got fed and started talking. They still found topics to talk about even though it physically shouldn’t be possible.
They knew each other more than any other person in their life’s now and Buck wouldn’t change a thing. This could also be because he had hopelessly fallen in love with Eddie around day 32.
But maybe it wasn’t actually so helpless. Either Buck was just starting to go insane, or Eddie had flirted with him yesterday. And since Buck didn’t really have anything to loose anymore, he thought ‘Fuck it’.”
“Hey Eddie? Okay so this might become very awkward if I’ve read you just completely wrong but I just hope I didn’t. I’m in love with you, have been since day 32 actually. Pathetic to count, I know, but I just thought you deserved to know.”
“You didn’t read anything wrong, Evan. I may not be the best with feelings but I can definitely tell you that I’m in love with you too, though I only noticed around day 46, sorry for that.” Buck could hear the grin on Eddie’s face and he knew he had a matching one.
After this day their talks had become more flirtatious and their tortures had become even worse, now fearing for their lovers lives.
Then on Day 93, right after their forced breakfast, Eddie was the reason Buck almost literally died. Buck was still downing his food when Eddie decided to just go for it.
“Marry me, Evan Buckley.” This sentence made Buck choke all over again. Eddie patiently waited for Buck to calm down, knowing that he couldn’t help with anything right now. When Buck calmed down he didn’t hesitate another second.
“Yes. Yes I’ll marry you Eddie Diaz.” From this day on their determination to escape this hell had tripled, if that was even possible.
Ironically, that only held a week because on day 100 a miracle happened. Buck was in the torture room, being faced with the same questions over and over again. He didn’t know how much longer his Body could handle the daily torture, not even speaking of Eddie’s ´, who had been here 2 weeks longer.
Just as the “grimace man”, as Buck like to call his questioner, opened his mouth again to ask another question, the door was kicked in and a bunch of soldier stormed the room, shooting everyone except for Buck in this room on sight.
The soldiers were SEALs, as Buck only saw now. The immediate relief was almost unbearable. As soon as someone untied his hands, he was crying and falling to the floor, the torture was over. Before he could get even one word out, his world went dark.
When he awoke again he wasn’t in the dark room, for the first time in so long. Instead he was laying in what seems like a medic tent that seemed oddly familiar.
And then she walked in. Lieutenant Barnes, who had trained Buck and had been his 'go to person' since his first day at the Navy SEALs.
She walked in with a smile, as she always did. Buck had missed her so fucking much.
"How you doing Buckley?" Even though she appeared very happy walking into the tent, her voice gave her away.
"I'm okay, I think. You got me out in one piece." He tried to joke with that last bit, but she did not find it as funny as intended.
And then he remembered and he hated himself for not remembering this from the beginning.
"Where's Eddie? Barnes, please tell me you got him out too" His voice started to break at the end. He couldn't live with himself if he got out but Eddie didn't.
"We got him Buckley, don't worry. The army was with us and they recovered their man too." Buck almost cried out of relief. They were both safe now.
"When can I see him? I need to see him as soon as possible!" Buck did not want to wait another minute to see his fiancé. It still felt surreal to say that, Maddie will be so glad he found someone that loved him.
But all of his hopes and happy feelings turned into dark ones as he saw his lieutenant's face.
"I'm afraid that's not possible Buckley. This operation had turned into a highly classified one as soon as your team went missing. There can be no info's out about this and the army also holds this as a classified mission."
Buck should've anticipated this. Every time he's happy, something comes to ruin it. He just wanted to see Eddie. Barnes continued.
"Because of this we are not allowed to tell anyone where or who the man from the army is and the army is not allowed to tell anyone where and who you are. I'm sorry Buckley."
His world broke at this. He would never see Eddie again. He found love and now he lost it.
Everything after this went by in a sort of trace. Buck got an honorable discharge and found himself traveling the world. He was bartending in Peru, working on ranches and even tried to become a stripper at one place. It hadn't been his proudest moment.
But Buck found nothing that made him feel like himself again. It was as if Eddie had taken a piece of his heart when they got parted.
The next time Buck really felt anything again was 4 years after he had been saved from captivity. He was 24 now and had just signed up to join the fire academy.
A year later he stood for ceremony, receiving his LAFD (probationary) firefighters badge. He was now officially part of station 118, his first day being tomorrow.
The next day, his first day of work, he came into the station not knowing what to expect.
But what he didn’t expect was that this team he'd be working with turned into his family so quickly.
Just after a few months all of them had become so important to him, that he couldn't imagine to lose them.
He also went by Buck full time now, having only went by that name as a code name while with the SEALs.
The 118 had stolen his heart, without him even wanting them too. He never went to any gatherings, he didn't talk about his personal life. But somehow the 118 still managed to make him part of their family.
It's been 6 months since he joined the 118 and so far the team has managed to not be to noisy about his personal life. But today they wanted answers.
"Hey Buckaroo, can we ask you a question? It's a bit personal" Hen asked him, approaching him on the couch with chimney, the latter seeming like he didn't really wanna be there.
This could probably be because the last time Chimney had asked him a personal question, he had dissociated and hands spoken the rest of the shift.
To be fair, it had been a question about Buck's scars that he got from his days of torture. But chimney didn't know that and just tried to be understanding of his friend's apparent "self-harm" scars.
But chimney hadn't known that, so seeing Buck so distraught after what he deemed loving support had made chimney approach personal topics with Buck lightly from there on.
But Buck had mostly recovered from that conversation, his therapist helping him a lot, so he thought that it couldn't hurt to answer them a question, seeing as they share their personal feelings so willingly with him.
"Yeah sure, Hen. Go for it." Honestly, he should've expected it. Buck's happiness can never last.
“Okay so, a bunch of girls always give you their number. You have never taken them which meant to me that you’re most likely not single. But you also never bring your maybe girlfriend with you. What’s up with that?”
Hen looked scared, like she regretted saying her question out loud the second it left her mouth. But it was said now so Buck had to decide what to answer her. What was he supposed to say?
‘Well guys, I got a fiancé that I haven’t seen in almost 5 years, whose voice I don’t even really remember since it’s been so long, because we were in captivity together. Then we got saved but couldn’t see each other because the mission got classified and we couldn’t know each other’s whereabouts’
Buck decided that he should definitely NOT tell them that. Instead he opted for something else that will hopefully satisfy them.
“It’s uhm.. well it’s complicated. I have someone but we haven’t had contact in nearly 5 years. Can we not talk about this anymore?”
“Of course Buck! Sorry for asking” After this Hen and Chimney hurried away from him, leaving him to his thoughts.
Did Eddie still think about him? Or did he try to forget he even existed to erase the painful time from their captivity? So many questions he didn’t have an answer too and so many answers he needed.
It might be selfish but he hoped that Eddie still thought about him. Because Buck definitely still thought about Eddie. The way he talked and laughed.
Buck never got the change to see Eddie’s face but he just knew that Eddie must be beautiful. Even if he wasn’t, Buck would love him regardless.
Another 6 months later and Buck was finally a real firefighter. The 118 had even become more of his family, which Buck didn’t even think possible.
He even opened up more to them. They knew he had been a Navy SEAL and that he was lost on what to do with his life after he got an honorable discharge. But he didn’t tell them about Eddie or that he had been in captivity for 100 days. He could never talk about that, not without Eddie right next to him.
It had been 2 months since he became an official firefighter and apparently they were supposed to get a new probie tomorrow. Cap had told Buck a few hours ago, wanting the new probie to become Buck’s partner in the field since he didn’t have one yet.
But of course, life never went the way it’s supposed too. When Buck awoke this morning it was surprisingly light outside. He looked at his phone and almost got a heart attack.
It was an hour after his shift had started and he had a bunch of texts from Hen, Chim and Cap had tried to call him 4 times. As a matter of fact, he was calling right now.
“Hey Cap, I am so sorry, my alarm didn’t go off and I just woke up, I’ll make my way to the station immediately” Buck just hoped that his captain wasn’t too angry with him.
“It’s fine Buck, just wanted to make sure you’re okay. It’s not like you to be late. Thought you were maybe scared about meeting Eddie” This made Buck freeze. Meeting who? It couldn’t be his Eddie, he had never told Hen and Chimney his name.
“He’s excited to meet you by the way. I mean I would like to meet my new partner too. Anyway try to hurry Buck, okay?” Buck just gave him a quick affirmation before he ended the call and stared into the void for a good 5 minutes.
Then he got up, put on his clothes and almost ran to his car, starting his drive to work. In the short time he’d had to think about the new probie, whose name was apparently Eddie because of course it is, he already decided that he didn’t like him.
And Buck knew that it wasn’t the new probie’s fault that his name was Eddie, but he couldn’t do anything but hate him for it.
When he walked into the station the first thing he noticed was a very handsome man working out shirtless in their gym. When he saw Buck he put a shirt on and walked over to him.
“Hey man, you must be Buck, right? Heard you were running a bit late. I’m Eddie.” The man, Eddie, held his hand out for Buck to shake but Buck could only stare at him.
Why did life had to treat him this bad?? First he loses his real Eddie and now a fake Eddie comes into his life and turns it upside down. Why couldn’t he be an asshole? Then Buck could at least hate him, but this man made it very hard to be hated.
But since Buck didn’t feel like confronting his confusing Eddie and fake Eddie feelings he just walked away, leaving Eddie standing there puzzled with his hand still hold out in front of him.
Buck went into the locker room, put on his uniform and then went to find Bobby. He apologized again for being late and just said yes when Bobby asked if he’d met Eddie already.
He left the office and then tried as hard as possible to go out of Eddie’s way. He was already on edge enough, seeing as todays was Buck’s 5 year anniversary of his discharge, which for him was more of an ‘I will definitely not hear of Eddie ever again’ anniversary.
Thanks to his normally nonexistent luck they’ve had a slow shift since he got there. He’d been at the station for 2 hours now and not 1 call.
Literally 10 minutes later, because of course it was, the alarm went off. This meant Buck had to sit in an enclosed space with fake Eddie. He was not looking forward to it.
In the truck Buck tried to look at anything except for fake Eddie. That luckily worked out well enough so that when they arrived at the scene he hadn’t had any further interactions with him.
The call was an easy one, a man slipped in his workshop. He workshop was a smart one, so it had called 911 luckily, as the man was unconscious on arrival.
Since Buck and fake Eddie weren't really needed for now they decided to look around a bit.
Turns out that wasn't a good idea because as soon as they reached the back of the workshop a shrill alarm sounded.
"TRESPASSERS, TRESPASSERS" And suddenly a wall came out of the ceiling, effectively locking Buck and Eddie together in a now very small space.
This was not good, so not good. Buck knew the panic attack was coming before it even arrived. Since the dark room he had developed severe claustrophobia, who could blame him.
And normally it wouldn't cause this bad of a reaction and more of very big discomfort. But right know he was in here with someone called Eddie and he couldn't stop but think back to his time in a room like this.
He must've spaced out badly because the next thing he realized was fake Eddie calling out his name, looking at him with panic in his eyes too.
"Man, you okay? You don't seem so well" Fake Eddie asked with nothing but concern in his voice.
"Claustrophobia" was the only thing Buck answered. If he talked any more he would fall right back into the dark room.
Then he just saw Eddie's eye go wide. He must've heard something over the radio but Buck couldn't really hear anything at this moment.
Eddie spoke into his radio and as soon as he probably got an answer Buck saw another change in Eddie's face, having nothing else to concentrate on right now. His face had went from shook into something that Buck would decipher as... fondness?
Before he could wonder more what that was about Eddie knelt in front of him, put both of his hands on Buck shoulder and spoke softly.
"You're okay Evan, I got you. I'm here now." And in this moment where fake Eddie called him Evan he realized 3 things.
Fake Eddie wasn't fake Eddie but real Eddie, he had found Eddie again after 5 years of loneliness and his fiancé was so incredibly amazing.
And just like this, all of his panic was gone. Being with someone you loved was able to do that.
"Eddie." Was the only thing he was able to get out before he broke down sobbing, right into Eddie's arms.
They stayed like that for a few minutes until both of them had calmed down. Buck just wanted to start talking when the wall ascended back into the ceiling and the rest of the team was standing there, looking at them with a concerned look.
"Everything okay Buck? You didn't answer your radio" Oh right, his radio. He had completely forgot about that in all his panic.
"Yeah sorry Cap, my claustrophobia got to me but Eddie helped me through it, I'm alright now" he said that last part only looking into Eddie's eyes.
He hoped the man got what he wanted to say. Buck wanted to talk to him about so much but that had to wait until they're at the station, he didn't want the team to know just yet.
Eddie seemed to understand though, as he had always done, only smiling at Buck and walking to the truck. Buck followed right behind, ignoring the weird looks of his team.
The ride back to the station was the same but so different at the same time. Buck was still quiet on the ride but this time, instead of looking anywhere but Eddie, he looked right at him and never took his eyes off.
But they didn’t even make it to the station. A minute before they would’ve pulled into the station, dispatch sent them to another call. Apparently some guy had a grenade stuck inside him?
When they got there they wasted no time since the man’s leg did not look good. Everyone except for Buck and Eddie were a bit stiffy with the fact that it’s a grenade, so when Eddie offered to join the man in the ambulance, Cap gladly said yes knowing his background.
Bobby had even asked Buck to go with Eddie and to ‘play nice’ which Buck found very ironic now. The ride to the hospital would be a few minutes so Buck decided to start their well needed talk but Eddie was faster.
“I need you to know I never forgot you. I searched for you but they wouldn’t tell me where you are. I have a ring in a drawer at home, if you still want it, Evan. I have loved you since day 46 and it never once changed.”
Buck was speechless. Everything he’d wished for over the last 5 years has come true. Eddie still loved him, even after all this time.
“I haven’t been able to stop searching for you too. It sent me all over the country actually, got me a lot of different jobs. I have a ring in my drawer too.” There was a moment where they both just stared into each other’s eyes and Buck just knew that everything would turn out alright.
That was until Buck started re-dressing the wound and saw that the grenade in the man’s leg was a live one. As soon as Eddie saw the panic in Buck’s eyes he didn’t hesitate a second to tell the driver to pull over.
That’s how they found themselves a few minutes later in the parking lot of the hospital, deciding what to do with the man.
When Eddie offered to go in and remove the grenade Buck didn’t hesitate to jump in too, not wanting to let his refound love blow himself up.
The minutes flew by, they were in and then they were out again. The ambulance blew up, both of them didn’t flinch. They just looked at each other silently agreeing to talk later on.
When their shift ended, Eddie invited Buck to his house and Buck happily said yes. As soon as Buck heard a little boy with crutches telling him that his name is Christopher and asking him who he is, Buck knew that life would be great again from now on.
3 months later Maddie was proudly staring at her brother as he kissed his newlywed husband in front of the altar.