Chapter Text
Sydney Sargent was a simple man. He ate only buttered bread, felt astounding amounts of empathy for hurt campers, and was sometimes unable to cope with adult life, and regressed to the mindset of a child. Jedidiah knew this, and thus they were thoroughly prepared when three of his fellow counselors walked in at ten to midnight, one of them clinging to the other two like a barnacle, with a thumb in his mouth. Rowan noticed immediately, and gently pulled Soren’s thumb out of his mouth, chastising.
“Don't do that, baby, you know that's not good for you.”
Sydney pulled his head up from his paperwork at Rowan’s tone, reminiscent of the one Jedidiah used when Sydney was tiny.
“ah! Counselors!” Sydney said, happily. “What can I do for you on this fine night?” Juniper and Rowan promptly ceased their cajoling with Soren, replaced with an air of unbridled nerves, and turned their attention from Soren, who had slipped his thumb back into his mouth and had begun to rock happily from side to side. “Let me guess,” said Sydney slyly. “You need something to replace… this.” he strolled over and gently pulled Soren's thumb from his mouth via his wrist. The counselors currently not regressed stared at Sydney in suspicion. Sydney walked back to his desk, rummaged through some drawers and pulled a pacifier nub from one of them and a pacifier base from another.
“You're lucky I have spares down here. If I had to wake Jeddie to get one from his office, he would not be happy, nevermind the fact he probably wouldn't even be asleep.” Sydney turned his attention away from the pacifier he had been preparing for soren and towards Rowan and Juniper, who were staring at him, slack jawed.
“what?” Sydney questioned, “you're staring at me like one of the dead fish you used to have to catch.
Juniper and Rowan picked their jaws up off the floor and did their best to look less shocked. The ‘best’ in question was quite poor, however it was better than the gaping-mouthed stares from before.
“it's just-” began Rowan, “you seem far too composed to not have seen this before. You keep pacifiers in your office?” he said, breathless.
Sydney shrugged.
“Well, jeddie keeps them in his office. I don't keep them in my study, mostly after the whole ‘elephant man stealing all my stuff’ incident, I figured they were safer with jeddie. Heck, I'M barely even allowed in his study after all we've been through. Soo..” the man trailed off, losing his train of thought. “Yeah. That's pretty much the gist of it. So YOU seem pretty surprised. Do I need to give you a rundown on Soren's current situation, or are you going to take the pacifier and hopefully get to sleep at a reasonable time?” Sydney held out the paci, gesticulating with it as he talked. Juniper reached out and took it from the shorter man's hand.
“Nah mate, I think we'll be fine. Though you do seem very familiar with this, whereas we know very little. I don't suppose you're free tomorrow?”
Sydney shrugged.
“I don't see why not. Come to my study after morning announcements and we can talk all about it. But for now, go to sleep. It's almost 13:70.”
Choosing to ignore Sydney's disregard for a basic timekeeping system, Juniper turned and began to steer Soren out the door.
“Thank you, my good chap, and I suppose I will see you tomorrow. Toodaloo!” They walked out of the door.
“Toodaloo, Juniper!” Sydney echoed. He walked back to his desk to finish his paperwork. It was gonna be a long night.
Wonderful art for this fic:
