Author's Note: done for Nanaho-Hime's DA (Dumbledore's Army) Challenge on the HPFC forum. My prompts were Angelina and the Battle of Hogwarts. I really like this, I may expand it someday.

Angel of Mercy

Angelina Johnson had never needed to know this before, but she discovered on the fateful night of the Battle of Hogwarts that she just didn't have the stomach for warfare.

All around her past and current students launched jinx after jinx at the Death Eaters who had stormed the castle. Angelina, on the other hand, could not bring herself to cast anything more than a shield charm. Upon noticing this, Alicia Spinnet banished her old friend from the front lines.

"Go help Madam Pomfrey if you won't fight!"

And so Angelina found herself ferrying Hogwarts' wounded to the nurse in the Great Hall. The task was just as horrifying as the battle; she had to see the awful toll the fight was taking on her friends and classmates. But at the same time, she told herself, she was helping without hurting anyone.

Then came the tragic trip in which she ran into Percy Weasley, who was carting a body himself and doubled over with sobs.

"W-who… ?" Angelina answered her own question as she gazed into the face of her one-time beaux. Many people had trouble telling the Weasley twins apart, but she knew in her heart that it was Fred who floated, eternally restful, beside his once-estranged brother. Percy moved on in silence, too overcome with his grief to reply. Angelina let him go.

But she could not complete this trip after what she had seen. She instead ducked into what seemed to be an empty corridor, littered in rubble, too shocked even to cry. Leaning against a window frame, she merely heaved, silently at first, then more and more violently as reality sunk in.

From the rubble came a feeble cry. Angelina spun around and gasped as she spotted a black-hooded Death Eater lying in a puddle of blood. The puddle slowly grew before her eyes.

"Kill me…" the Death Eater rasped.

"What?" Angelina lifted her wand in case this was some kind of trick.

"Kill me!" he repeated, stronger. "They didn't have to guts to do it… even after I killed one of them… they'll leave me here to wait… in pain…"

Angelina realized in horror that this wizard must have caused Fred's death. She could retaliate, he even wanted her to… her wand arm trembled.

"Anything is better than waiting… the Dark Lord will finish me if you won't…"

That did it, in Angelina's mind. For all that this man had done, he didn't deserve to fall to the leader he had trusted. Better to let the other side finish him. "A-avada…" she tried, her voice small.

"You have to mean it," he mumbled, wincing at the exertion of the conversation.

"Avada kedavra!" An unfamiliar green flash burst from Angelina's wand. Rather than the look of horror that usually graced the curse victim's faces, the Death Eater's final expression was one of gratitude. Angelina closed his eyes and fled.

-

For all the years that followed, Angelina remained mute on the subject of the Battle of Hogwarts and the role she had played. Even when George came to her for comfort, she neglected to tell him that she had avenged his brother's death. After all, it wasn't an act of revenge.

She had done it, the only curse she ever cast, as an act of mercy.