A/N: I want to apologize to everyone, apparently somehow the text for this story got overwritten with the text for another story of mine, One Last Thing. I have replaced the text with the correct text. I have no idea how this happened.

Again, my apologies to everyone.

Sergeant Jaune Arc sighed as he gazed out over the burning remnants of the town. Not long ago Vanguard had been a thriving small town, a new industry in gravity Dust bringing wealth and prosperity to what had been a sleepy little burg in the middle of nowhere. Now it was a shattered ruin, a dying remnant of what it once was. Fires still burned in parts of the city from the Outer Dark attack days before; there wasn't the manpower available to handle all the fires. Those fires they had managed to put out still smoldered, adding more smoke into the stifling night air. At this point, he figured he'd be smelling smoke when he was three days dead. Clean laundry and showers were nearly forgotten luxuries. What water they had was needed for drinking, and that was dwindling rapidly between the town's defenders and the few civilians that remained.

He sighed. He was a dead man walking, him and every trooper with him, plus every man, woman, child, and probably dog, cat, and rat in the town. The only question left really was how fast it took the Outer Dark to kill them. But damned if he wasn't going to take as many of the bastards with him as possible.

The sound of the roof door behind him brought him out of his maudlin reverie. "Saved you a spot. And a beer, probably one of the last ones in town. It's cold, even. Don't know where Ren found them, and I'm pretty sure I'd rather not know."

Lieutenant Pyrrha Nikos stepped up to lean against the parapet next to him. As always, she was as neatly made up as the situation allowed, even still wearing a touch of makeup. "I will agree with you about not wanting to know where they came from. And I'll take the beer." Nikos took a deep pull of the beer. "A dark ale. Not my usual taste, but it goes well with our imminent demise, don't you think?"

"Pyrrha-"

"Don't, Jaune." Pyrrha's composure broke, and she met his gaze, tears welling in her eyes. "It's all over. We've done all we can, slaughtered countless numbers of them and their Grimm, but still, they keep coming. And we haven't been reinforced, and there's no way we can evacuate. Even command has admitted we're a lost cause. Our new orders are to 'hold our position until relieved.' So don't lie to me and tell me there's still hope."

"Yeah," he admitted with a sigh, turning his eyes once more towards the burning corpse of Vanguard. "I just didn't want to hear it from you, too." He slid his hand along the parapet, intertwining his fingers' with Pyrrha's. "Shitty part is, I'm never going to get the chance to introduce you to my family."

"Seven sisters, plus the woman formidable enough to bring all of you into the world? I think I might almost prefer to face the Outer Dark." They shared a laugh, a dry, gallows chuckle, and Pyrrha leaned into Jaune. "I love you, Jaune. I wish we could grow old together."

"Same here. And I love you too." After years of dancing around their feelings for each other, they'd finally taken the plunge a month ago. Jaune cursed their cowardice. Regs be damned; he should have told Pyrrha how he felt a long time ago.

The moment was shattered by new explosions at the edge of the town. "Damn, can't even finish a beer around here. I'm gonna complain to the local tourism board." He turned to go, only to be stopped by Pyrrha's hand on his arm. "Jaune...just in case I never get the chance, the answer would have been 'yes'."

He nodded and the two of them bolted down the stairs from the roof of the town hall that had become their impromptu headquarters. They were met by Corporal Ren coming up the stairs, breathing hard from running but serene as always. "Sorry to interrupt your private time, but they're back in force. Think this might be it, this time."

Jaune grinned. "It's all good. Everything that needed to be said got said. Everyone moving into position?" Ren nodded. "Good, thenwe're go forDisco, unless the lieutenant has a different idea?" Nikos shook her head. "Let's roll."

Beyond the town, a convoy of four colorful vehicles thundered through the night. "Are you sure about this, Ruby? It looks like we'll be too late."

"I'm sure."

"How sure?"

"Sis, I'm the second-surest I've ever been in my life."

"And what would be the surest you've ever been, hmm?" a third voice came sharply over the channel."

"Weiss, don't be dense. We have to do this sometime," came a fourth voice, weary of revisiting a discussion that had been done to death.

"I know, I just...I wish there was another way to do this."

"We're out of options." Ruby's voice was firm. "And they're out of time."

Arc charged out of the front of the town hall turned command post, running towards a waiting jeep. "Jaune, wait!" Lieutenant Nikos was running down the steps as he skidded to a stop. She wrapped her arms around him and pulled him in for a kiss. What the hell, he thought as he leaned into her for a moment, it's not like everyone doesn't already know. They pulled apart and he whispered to her, "I love you. See you in Valhalla."

"I'll save you a seat," she replied, blushing at what she had done. He laughed and jumped into the jeep as she ran back into the command post.

The Outer Dark had come for one final dance. Pity they didn't realize that they weren't the one picking the music.

When Jaune reached his position, his troops were already firing into the oncoming ranks of the Outer Dark infantry and the Grimm they brought with them. He cursed. Before the rise of the Outer Dark, Grimm had almost been consigned to the realm of extinction, with only a handful of them appearing every year. Now the shadowy beasts accompanied all but the smallest of Outer Dark forces. Well, tonight they would find something new to fear.

"Let's hear it for history books, everyone," he shouted, and those troops within earshot responded with a grim rumble of laughter. "Let them hit the barricades before we trip the trap," he whispered to Corporal Valkyrie. The redhead nodded with crazed satisfaction. She'd been there since the very beginning, she was more than ready to make the cultists pay.

Carefully timed rate fire sprang from their firing positions, not the rapid crazed fire of panicked troops, but the slow, steady fire of professional troops who know they're going to be there a while. Grimm and cultists fell, the Grimm dissipating into smoke, the cultists twitching on the ground as the last of the life fled their bodies. Much as he loathed to admit it, Jaune felt a sick satisfaction in the cultists' deaths, given how many comrades of his they'd sent to their deaths.

Winchester dropped down next to Arc in his fighting position. "They've got us surrounded, Sarge, they're everywhere!" he shouted, panic evident in his voice.

"Good, we've got them where they want us," Arc yelled, back, not even flinching as a near-miss sent fragments of masonry close enough to leave scratch marks on his face.

"Maidens, ever since you and the Lieutenant started screwing-" Winchester stopped as Arc's pistol appeared in front of his eyes. He hadn't even seen Arc move, much less look in his direction.

"Don't. Go. There," Jaune's voice was low and steady, which oddly enough was more terrifying than anything else Cardin Winchester could imagine right then. "Winchester, if you'd been paying attention the last few days instead of screwing off as normal, you'd know what's about to happen. As it stands, I'm considering shooting you myself and adding your corpse to the barricade around my position. At least then you'd be some use."

"My father-"

"-Is much further away than my pistol. Choose." Cardin gulped and backed off, taking a place near Arc and opening fire on the enemy. Jaune had to stop himself from laughing; as far as he knew, this was the first time Corporal Cardin Winchester, scion of one of Atlas's finest families and sentenced to penal military enlistment for things Arc really didn't want to think about right now, had actually fired upon the enemy in combat. Will wonders never cease?

He stared through the smoke from the burning town and the battle, trying to gauge the best moment to spring their trap. "Come on, come on, let's dance you bastards," Arc muttered under his breath, earning him a puzzled look from Winchester, who turned his attention back to the enemy when Arc glared at him. He held out his right hand and Valkyrie put the trigger in it, resting her hand on top of his and giving it a squeeze, careful not to hit the button. "See you all in Valhalla!" he yelled as the 'right' moment finally came and his thumb came down on the detonator switch.

The flame fougasse is a horrifically simple weapon, at its most basic consisting of a fuel oil drum set on its side with an explosive charge at the base to simultaneously propel and ignite the fuel. When detonated, they can spew burning oil in an area up to ten feet wide and thirty feet long. The troops under Arc's command had spent the last several days rounding up every drop of fuel oil and drum left in the town and building fougasses in every building that wasn't already on fire, concentrating on main streets near their position.

The result was...horrific.

Grimm screamed as the flames engulfed them, not their normal hunting cries but what Arc could swear were screams of agony as they burned away into nothing. Cultist troops and vehicles were set ablaze, the unlucky ones falling to the ground, screaming and writhing as they tried to put themselves out. The lucky ones died instantly. Arc could see an improvised assault vehicle ahead of him turn over, bodies spilling out of the back hatch, the interior an inferno; one of the fougasses must have caught them as they were opening the hatch to deploy.

"Think they're going to be mad at us?" Valkyrie chuckled as she checked her rifle.

"They can put it on my tab," Arc smirked with a laugh; the fougasse had been his idea. "Alright, pass the word: Hold position until I say otherwise. Keep an eye on the firebreak; we don't need the fire crossing into out position. If there are any left, they're going to be coming in really pissed off, so be ready."

"You might even say they'll be...flaming mad, Sergeant."

"One more pun like that, Valkyrie, and you're cleaning latrines for a week."

"Awww, I didn't know you cared."

"Huh?"

"If I'm cleaning latrines for a week, that means I'm alive in a week, doesn't it?"

Arc laughed, then flinched as there was movement in the smoke, and he felt his blood run cold. It couldn't be... But it was. Coming out of the smoke and the flames were more Grimm, big ones this time. First up was a Creep two stories tall, and behind it, a Deathstalker wide enough to fill a four-lane street.

They had a second wave. For a moment, he cursed himself for setting off the trap so early, but then realized it didn't matter anyway. The first wave would have been enough to finish them if it hadn't been decimated by the trap. "They held their heavies for a second wave," Arc muttered, barely aware he had spoken aloud until Winchester asked him, "So what do we do now, Sarge?"

"Die, I guess. The trap was a Hail Mary; I got nothing else."

Winchester checked his rifle, seeing how many rounds were left. "Hey, Sergeant, just so you know: I fucking hate you. I almost want to shoot you myself."

Arc shot Winchester a gallows grin as he checked his own weapon. "Just save the last round for yourself, Winchester. You know what these bastards do to prisoners."

All around them came the crackle of rifle fire as the troops entrenched around them began tofire at the titanic Grimm. Not that it would do much good; against a Grimm that big, rifle fire was like shooting spitballs at the sun. but it it was the principle of the matter more than anything. Better to die with a rifle in your hand than screaming on a cultist altar. Arc was holding his fire, waiting for a good shot at the Creep's face, when the incredible happened.

The titanic Grimm went flying to one side, crashing to the ground.

Jaune blinked. What the hell...? Then he saw it, and shook his head, a dry, rasping chuckle in his throat.

What had knocked the Creep to the ground was a variable-configuration (VC) construction mech. Someone had driven it into the Grimm's legs as a last-ditch effort to stop the cultist advance. The robotic construction machines had the mass and power to go toe-to-toe with big Grimm but lacked agility and mobility. Every attempt to use them in combat hand ended in utter failure. All Arc could think to do was salute the poor brave fool at the controls. Wish I knew your name, buddy, but all I can think to do is salute you when I'm dead. They'd even taken the time to paint the thing. Usually, construction mechs were some bright safety color; this one was black with red trim. Where'd they get that much black paint in town?

Then the machine unfolded from its vehicle-like travel configuration to its humanoid working form, and Arc's jaw dropped. Normally mechs moved slowly, ponderously, but this one moved more like an ebon, angry god of war. It assumed a waiting stance as the Creep rolled to its feet, facing the mech and giving a thundering Grimm hunting cry. The mech responded by turning its right hand palm up, making a Come at me, then sort of gesture

The Creep roared and charged, hitting the mech hard enough to make its feet slide backward, digging furrows in the broken asphalt. In response, the mech dug its hands into the sides of the Grimm's neck, just behind its snapping jaws and flipping it over the mech's head, piledriving the Grimm into the ground, shattering its bony skull and killing it, leaving the Grimm dissolving into mist.

"Get out your scroll," Arc hissed at Winchester. "Get some video of this."

"Already on it, Sarge. Figured a story like this with proof, I'll never pay for my drinks again."

"You, me, and everyone else here," Arc laughed. "Winchester, you know more about high society and doing things properly than I do. Is it proper to propose to a lady in the middle of an inferno?" The two men shared a laugh as they watched the mech turn toward the Deathstalker.

Apparently, the Deathstalker had more on the ball than the Creep had. The scorpion-like Grimm scuttled back and forth, claws snapping, looking for an opening. Its tail snapped forward, only for the mech to catch it in both hands before the Grimm could pull it back. The Grimm's claws snapped at the mech's arms and legs, trying to free itself to no avail. The mech just ripped the huge Grimm's tail from its body, leaving the wound streaming smoke as it threw the tail aside and brought both hands down on the Deathstalker's head, stunning it for a moment as the mech brought its hands down for a second and then a third blow, sending the Grimm to the ground to start to dissipate.

The mech wasn't done yet, though. What Jaune had thought was some sort of safety bar or something on its shoulders turned, facing out towards the edge of town. It spoke with a crack of thunder, and he realized it was some sort of cannon, though not any type he'd ever seen or heard of. An explosion matched the cannon's fire and it spoke three more times, explosions matching each one.

Its work done, or at least stopped for the moment, the mech turned toward Arc's position. A figure climbed down a rope ladder from the cockpit, and as they came closer, Arc could see it was a young woman, her hair black with red highlights, and wearing a jumpsuit.

She smiled. "So, who's in charge around here?"