It was absolute chaos. Sparks flew everywhere. They hit off trees, snapping branches and even uprooting them. Cracks, pops, booms, and crashes were heard from every direction. Jets of red, orange, green, and purple flew from wands as nearly a dozen of figures ran through the forest. Any onlooker would have thought a firework show was happening deep in the woods just at twilight.

However, this was no Fourth of July celebration. It was a full on battle. Snatchers were chasing five different wizards all around the abandoned woods. Scabior chased after a woman, as he could tell from her long reddish-brown hair. She was quick, running ahead of him, and a skilled witch, casting spells in silence in attempts to trip him up. She would block all of his curses, or revert them back to him, or cast some of her own. She turned back a Stupefy so quickly that Scabior only missed it by a hair. She Reducto-ed a tree stump so unexpectedly that it exploded in Scabior's face and allowed her to get a few more meters ahead of him.

How she came to be his, however, Scabior knew he could take no credit for. She had turned to throw another vicious curse at him as she ran on, when her foot became caught under a protruding tree root. The woman fell to the ground, her wand tossed from her grasp, and she was his. Scabior quickly was on top of her and grabbed her wand. She turned to look up at him and spat in his face.

Scabior recognized her at once. Her green eyes, in all their fury, pierced through to his core. Her creamy skin and high cheekbones were just the way he remembered. Except now she looked a bit more mature, and more rugged as she had been on the run. But she was still painfully beautiful. She writhed underneath him with all of her might, her long hair everywhere. She started to get away, as Scabior had lightened his weight on her in his realization, but he quickly focused on containing her. She didn't recognize him at all, Scabior realized, because she was fighting too much to get a good look at him.

"Scarlett?" Scabior asked.

The girl immediately stopped fighting. She shook her hair out of the face and looked up at her captor. Her expression quickly turned from confusion to shock to anger, and again she was fighting, though now she was vocal.

"Scabior! Get off of me! I'll kill you! I WILL KILL YOU! Let go of me, wretch! Coward! Stand and fight me, you traitor! I'll KILL you!"

"Scarlett, stop it," Scabior said with force. He produced ropes from the end of his wand and Scarlett lay bound beneath him.

As she could no longer fight him with her wand or her body, the woman now resorted to a verbal attack.

"See you're still the scum you were when I threw you in Azkaban, you filth! Always working for the highest bidder. Coward!"

Scabior suddenly felt conflicted, though he could not deem it possible for he had never felt thus before in his life. He thought back to ten years ago, to when he was still a schoolboy at Hogwarts. They were in their fifth year then, he and Scarlett. He remembered the late-night studying, or more like tutoring for him, that they would do in the library before potions exams. He remembered the afternoons they would spend by the Great Lake, talking about nothing until it was too dark to see. He remembered practically begging her to do his essays for him, which she never did, but she was always most helpful. She, a Ravenclaw, was always very bright. The truth of the matter was that he had been infatuated with her, which was unheard of from a Slytherin. But her blood was pure enough, so he didn't mind.

Scabior also recalled when, five years later, Scarlet had placed him in Azkaban.. She was recruited to the Auror's office straight out of Hogwarts and went to work for the Ministry of Magic while she was still only seventeen. Scarlet had caught him and other dark wizards on a raid the Ministry conducted then. He remembered the look in her eye when she had him cornered and realized it was him. It was quite like tonight: shock, confusion, and anger. Scarlet was present at his trial before the Wizenagmont, and personally escorted him to Azkaban. The only words she spoke to him then were, "Look at you. Look at what you've become. And to think we used to be friends. To think, I used to like you." He couldn't even bring himself to hate her then, as she placed him in chains, locked him behind bars, and left him in a cage.

He couldn't dislike her now, either. She was a known member of the Order of the Phoenix. She was an Auror that had worked for the Ministry of Magic and had fled once it had fallen into the Dark Lord's control. Her name was on his list. And yet, he felt terrible apprehending her.

"Scarlett, shut up."

"COWARD!" she screamed again. "You think I'm actually going to listen to you? You think I give a damn about anything you have to say? You're a sell-out, a traitor, and a bastard!"

"Scarlett, please," he said apologetically. "You're on the list, I have no choice."

"Oh, do I detect a flicker of remorse?" she mocked back. "Finally realizing the costs of our actions, are we? You deserved to rot in Azkaban, you selfish git, and I'll see to it that you do when all of this is over!"

"You're not in much of a position to be making threats," Scabior said, getting to his feet and sending sparks from the tip of his wand to alert the other Snatchers as to his location.

"Yet," she spat.

"Do you think I had a choice?" Scabior said through clenched teeth, bending down to the ground to get in her face. "Do you think I could say no to the Dark Lord after I was broken out of Azkaban?"

"You did when you joined him six years ago! You've always been quick to show your support and fascination with the Dark Lord," she again mocked. "Didn't know who he'd force you to go after? Didn't know what side you were on? Well, now you do."

Scabior would have said something back, but at that moment, eight other people joined him and Scarlett.