The more Sam clutched at him and tried to curl in close, the more the words just fell out, a seemingly-endless stream of nonsense that was supposed to help. The tiny part of his mind not currently focusing on all of this going on thought he sounded like a babbling idiot, like a liar because it isn’t okay, you can’t just tell her it’s okay when it isn’t - and eventually that part of him, combined with the twist of no nonono in his gut at Sam’s face went blank, eyes not focusing on him anymore - those things were enough to choke back the words.
He knelt down next to her in silence, one hand brushing lightly at the cuts, trying to determine how deep they were (not bad, it isn’t too bad, she’s not dying, just needs to be cleaned and then she’ll be fine). Once that had been figured out, he moved to start brushing her hair away from her throat, trying to be as careful as possible, not to press the bruises, not to pull her hair where it tangled together.
The words came back when he got a clearer view of the damage done there, apologies spilling out because just like that he can tell exactly what this was, exactly why and that makes it his fault. It’s his fault some demon had it’s hand around her neck, it’s his fault because if it weren’t for him, they wouldn’t have needed to keep her quiet, and she would only have a couple of cuts, and, kriff, he can’t deal with this, he doesn’t know how to make it okay. He clutches at her hand with one of his, eyes burning, and ducks his head for a long moment, forehead brushing her shoulder, trying to collect himself because he’s actually tripping back towards that unsteady dark line, and he’s not naive enough to think he’ll fall but he doesn’t want to take the chance. His eyes are still burning, watering, but he isn’t crying, that’s the opposite of what Sammy needs right now, he doesn’t want to scare her. He doesn’t want her to think she’s dying when she isn’t.
She isn’t dying. She’ll be okay.
Jacob sucked in a huge gulp of air, let it out in a shaky rush that ended in a tiny laugh, and pressed his forehead against her shoulder properly, for just a second, grounding himself - and then pulling away, sitting upright. She wasn’t dying. He could still help her. It was going to be okay. His ability to heal with the Force was much lower than he would like, and right now it felt like even trying to start fixing any of the damage would be like trying to turn a doorknob with no hands, batting ineffectually at it with stubby wrists, or something (which triggered a shudder, a rush of relief that all of Sam’s limbs were intact). He’d try, though, he would, and after this he was going to learn it more, because he’d never thought he’d need it, not really, he never wanted to be a doctor or a vet or anything like that so he’d focused on other things, like mind tricks and recognizing brain patterns and studying and he’d thought maybe someday he’d try politics, drag the Solo name back into a government position without darkness, and now, what good did any of that do him?
“It’s okay, Sammy. It’s not serious, you’ll be fine, okay?” He touched her cheek with one hand (brushing at dried tearstains, choking back more of that dark rage for a second before he calmed, focused, tried to at least kill some of the pain she was feeling and drag her back to him), trying to draw her attention to him instead of through him. “Hey, c’mon, Sam, look at me.”