Cho took heavy, gasping breaths from behind the statue she had just ducked behind to get her bearings, before she shot back out again to fire a curse in the direction of the masked man on her tail, ducking behind it again as a stream of colour was pointed in her direction. The two had been tagging hexes and curses at each other back and forth for the last twenty or so minutes, and the man’s experience obviously outweighed Cho’s own, as he was getting closer and closer to hitting her, and she was getting more and more tired. There was bleeding coming from her upper arm, which didn’t help the feelings of faintness, but she didn’t have time to worry about that now, or look for a healer. She had to knock the Death Eater out before he did the same, or worse to her. She couldn’t die. She’d gone into battle, promising herself she’d avenge the deaths of her loved ones. Even though the person who killed Cedric was long gone, these people were still his followers, and they were the very people who had been directly or indirectly responsible for Seth and Michael’s deaths. Her mind was in too much of a panic to remember everything she had been practising, and it wasn’t until later she had forgotten she could’ve made a lot less work for herself by disarming the bastard sooner. There were screams, and crashes all around her, but she blocked them out, and shot a stunning spell at the figure, which missed him by millimetres, and moved clearly into view as the statue exploded into pieces, stone debris scratching at her face.
“Expelliarmus!” she shouted, as she watched the wand fly out of his hand, and ran into the open area where it had fallen and, casting a shield charm on herself as she moved. The Death Eater had already dived for it, so Cho knew she had to move fast. She kicked the wand backwards with her heel to move it out of the man’s reach, and her eyes widened as she heard him begin to call out a summoning charm. If he got the wand, with her so close, she didn’t stand a chance. Pointing her wand at his chest, she racked her brain for a spell, calling out in a shaking voice the first offensive one that came to her.
“Flipendo!” She moved backwards, expecting the target to fly backwards through the air, but instead, the man jolted a few inches off the ground, and then landed back down with a painful cracking sound, and Cho stood, her wand still pointed at his heart, waiting for his next move. There wasn’t one, and Cho froze up, seeing his eyes behind the mask were wide open, and realising exactly what that meant. She’d killed someone, and in her eyes, that made her just as bad as them, and she backed away from the body, having enough sense to dive out of the way as a curse was fired directly at her, but she didn’t see by who, and terrified, apparated away from the scene. She found herself at the entrance, and stepped into the nearest floo, muttering her home address. She found herself instead emerging from the fireplace in the Leaky Cauldron, and avoiding the eyes of anyone there, she hurried outside, and apparated away from Diagon Alley, not wanting to be around other people. Her body hit a grassy verge by the side of a road, and she wasn’t sure exactly where she was, but she was alone, and pressing her palms to the ground, she was sick, and as the pain and what she had done hit her all at once, she let out a loud sob.