A/N: Basically I watched the brain worms episode and thought 'yeah, I'm sure the sixteen year old who just killed someone for the first time handled that just fine'. So I decided to write something about her actually dealing with that guilt and trauma. Plus 'Creche to Command' made me absolutely adore Gree and Barriss's sibling relationship so I just had to put that in there.

The chrono on the wall read 01:34. Bariss was supposed to be asleep.

She couldn't sleep. She couldn't breathe.

It had been more than a week since the incident with the Geonosian worms and the medics had told her there were no lasting effects from her exposure to them.

Incident. Exposure. These were the words she had used to write her report, to explain what had happened to her master and the rest of the Council. Tidy, emotionless words that did not convey her terror, her helplessness - her guilt.

Jedi weren't supposed to be controlled by their emotions. They were supposed to allow their emotions to pass through them, in and out - like breathing.

Breathing. The thing that she was now failing at as spectacularly as she had failed at controlling her emotions.

Her lungs kept contracting and expanding, but it was as if nothing was actually happening. She felt light-headed, as if she was about to faint.

Jedi weren't supposed to kill needlessly. In that she had failed as well.

Every time she closed her eyes - sometimes even when they were open - she saw the worm protruding from the soldier's mouth, her lightsaber cutting through his chest. Why hadn't she taken more time? Tried to kill the parasite instead of its host? The moment her saber had ignited she realised the connection between the troopers attacking them and the worms. She knew they were being controlled. So why hadn't she hesitated? Why had she just carried on? As if the life she had taken didn't matter.

There were many things Jedi weren't supposed to do. Bariss had always done her best to avoid the vices the Order warned against. She was calm, studious, respectful - everything a Jedi Padawan was supposed to be. Outwardly at least. Inwardly - where it mattered most - she was anything but.

It was too much. The memories, her thoughts - everything. It was just - she had to get out of here. She had no idea where she was going; she only knew she desperately needed to be anywhere that wasn't her room, with its leering walls and the glaring numbers of the chrono.

She wandered the halls of the ship. Briefly, she thought of going to Master Luminara, but quickly dismissed the idea. Her master was no doubt beginning to realise her mistake in taking Bariss as a Padawan after the successive disasters of Geonosis. There was no need to confirm her suspicions of just how bad Bariss was at being a Jedi.

Walking didn't seem to help her breathing problem. She felt sick and dizzy. Her teeth chattered even though she didn't feel cold. Her hands shook.

The light in the rec room was on and she moved towards it like a moth to a flame. Gree was sitting there, filling out reports on a datapad. He looked up when she walked in and frowned.

"Bariss? Are you all right?"

"I - I'm - " she didn't know how to answer. She nodded, then shook her head.

"I - don't - don't -"

She couldn't even form a full sentence.

Gree stood up, frowning in concern.

"Are you sick? Do you need to go to the medbay?"

She shook her head emphatically. She didn't want to go to the medbay, didn't want them to have to waste time on her when there were soldiers with actual injuries.

"It's - fi - fine."

"You don't look fine. What's the matter, vod'ika?"

That was the thing that finally sent her over the edge. Gree had recently taken to calling her by the Mandalorian term for younger sibling. He knew she hated being called Commander.

Tears slipped down her face, flowing out in a rush she couldn't stop.

"I don't - it's -" she wasn't even sure what she was trying to say. Staying upright felt like a monumental effort so she let herself sink to the ground. Her breath continued to rattle in and out of her lungs at a breakneck pace.

She heard Gree crouch down next to her.

"You need to breath, vod'ika."

She almsot laughed. She had been trying to do just that for hours now.

"Can't -"

"Yes, you can," Gree sounded so sure, "come on, in - that's it, now hold it in -"

She only managed to hold on to the air for a second before it was rushing out of her again.

"Try again - in, hold - good. Now out - deeper, exhale fully. Now in again."

Bariss hadn't had this much trouble controlling her breathing since she was a crecheling. Eventually though she managed to hold on to the slow steady rhythm for a full five breaths.

"There's - something wrong with me," she said, once she actually had enough air to speak.

"Do you want me to call one of the medics? Or Master Luminara?"

The panic she had only just managed to subdue, swelled once again.

"No, no, please don't. She - I don't want - her to know."

"Know what?"

"That I -" she wrapped her arms around herself and sobbed.

"All right, Bariss. It's okay, I'm won't call the general. But I need you to talk to me. What can I do to help?"

She shook her head. He had already done enough. She should be able to deal with this by herself. She should get up and go back to bed.

"Is it all right if I give you a hug?"

She nodded before she could stop herself.

It was so stupid. She wasn't a youngling; she didn't need comfort - she certainly didn't deserve it. Yet she couldn't bring herself to pull away from Gree.

"You're all right, vod'ika," Gree soothed, "you're safe. Everything's going to be okay."

"No - I - it's not."

She took a deep breath, finally pulling away from Gree.

"I killed him, Gree. I killed him."

"Oh, vod'ika," she couldn't see his face - didn't dare to look - but he sounded inexpressibly sad, "that wasn't your fault."

"It was. He - he didn't have a choice. I did. I could have found another way…"

She started crying again. She wished it would stop. Wiping angrily at her eyes, she continued,

"It should have been me. I should have been the one to die. I begged Ahsoka -"

"Bariss, no."

Gree put his hands on her shoulders, forcing her to look at him.

"Don't do that, vod'ika. Don't you ever think that you would be better off dead. You did make a choice - a hard choice I wish you never had to face. But that doesn't mean you should have been the one to die."

"But why? Why did I survive when so many others didn't?"

"I don't know. But I do know that I thank the Light that you did."

Bariss wasn't sure how Gree could feel grateful that she was alive when she didn't feel it herself. She was sure he and Master Luminara and Ahsoka and everyone else would be able to get along just fine without her.

Gree said something, but Bariss was too caught up in her thoughts to hear him properly.

"Sorry?"

"It's still the middle of the night cycle. Do you want me to walk back to your room with you or would you rather stay here?"

She should go. Now that she wasn't actively panicking anymore she should get out of Gree's way. But the prospect of going back to her room made her insides twist in sickening knots. What if she had another panic attack? Or something else went wrong?

"Come on," Gree said, "you can sleep on the couch. I'll get you a blanket."

Bariss was grateful for Gree's understanding, but she also felt ashamed. She was a Jedi Padawan. She should be better than this. Master Luminara would be so disappointed in her.

A part of her - a bitter, twisted part she hadn't known about before - said that maybe her master deserved to be disappointed. Maybe seeing Bariss fail would make her realise how impossibly high her standards were.

She quickly told that part to shut up.

Gree dimmed the lights and sat down on the floor in front of the couch, almost as if they were on campaign and he was keeping watch.

"You can sleep, vod'ika. Nothing bad is going to happen, I promise."

"I know. It's just... it doesn't feel that way."

Gree turned around so that he could look her in the eye.

"I know it doesn't. But you trust me, right?"

Bariss nodded.

"Then trust me when I say it's going to be all right."

She nodded again, tears slipping down her cheeks. Force, she was so tired of crying. She couldn't seem to control it though.

"You're going to be okay, Bariss," Gree said, tucking the blanket around her feet since he knew they tended to get cold at night, "Me and General Unduli and the rest of the legion, we've all got your back."

Bariss didn't believe that. But she trusted Gree, trusted that her brother wouldn't lie to her.

She closed her eyes and breathed. Before she knew it, she was asleep.