As Jaune Arc impaled a Beowolf on his sword he had to quickly assess the rapidly deteriorating situation at hand. The two combined teams of Ruby's and his own were being practically buried alive in Grimm, from all accounts the flanking teams had crumbled and even heavy bombardments of Mortar strikes were not able to thin the mass of them cutting them off from any form of retreat.

As Jaune sought out his next opponent as the screams and shouts of the soldiers and huntsmen around him he spotted Ruby as she seemed to effortlessly scythe any Grimm that came into her reach.

Jaune stepped towards Ruby and started to fight near her as he spoke "Ruby, I got an idea and you're going to hate this."

Ruby Fired off a shot from her rifle and took the head off of a nearby Ursa. "Alright, I don't like most of your plans but what do you got for me?"

Jaune paused and said, "Take command of my team, and hand me as many Satchel charges as you have so I can collapse the breach."

Ruby paused for a second as well before aiming up and putting a shot through the Wing of a rushing Gryphon that Jaune then took a moment to cleave through as it fell. Once that was done She turned and looked at him. "Your right I do hate that plan."

Jaune kicked a riffle up into his hands and shot at a Beowolf that was approaching Ruby from behind her catching it in the throat. Not a great shot considering he was aiming for its head but at least the Grim went down. Dropping the rifle to his side he spoke "Look, I know this looks insane, but someone has to get to the breach even if it's a one-way trip, hell we all kinda expected it to play out like this."

Ruby Shook her head "Dammit Jaune, suicide is not a combat plan!"

"Yeah, I know. But we need to seal that breach or else they will just keep coming, with some luck you guys can draw out the Grimcaller and take that thing down as well." Jaune said as his eyes darted around looking for Grimm that might be trying to take advantage of the situation. "If you all can manage that the Grimm will fall into disarray and you all can clean house on them from there."

Ruby nodded "I still hate this idea, but okay…" She said as she called the others over to make the exchange.

One by one the other Huntsmen handed Jaune their explosive satchel packs, one would be enough to collapse the tunnel the Grimm were coming from. Seven would be overkill. One by one they all rushed back to the fight after wishing Jaune luck in his plan, All except one.

"You are not going out there alone!" Weiss said in a stern tone. "I am not going to sit here and let my partner go out and die with our only tools for sealing the breach!"

Jaune started walking towards a makeshift stockpile of spare weapons and ammo they had formed in the center of their defensive circle and pulled out a handgun and several magazines. "I'm not in the mood to debate this right now Weiss, we both know that I can do this."

"Yeah, but we both know you're not going to make it back alive if you do go alone!" Weiss shouted back and Jaune.

Jaune looked into the angry eyes of Weiss and sighed "You need to survive, you more than any of us." Jaune eyes narrowed "You are meant for more than this battle, you know this."

Weiss shook her head. "I refuse! I refuse to carry out any 'Orders' that require me to let someone I love go off to their deaths without putting up the biggest stink I can over it," Weiss said before pausing for a moment. In a soft tone, she got close and whispered to Jaune "So it's like this. Your either going to allow me to go along, or I start telling everyone about the Fall maiden,"

Jaune paused and frowned "Fine, but you if you die…."

"You'll be right behind me telling me 'I told you so' I know," Weiss said with a slight smirk.

Jaune scoffed "Girl please, I was going to say 'I'm shacking up with Ruby'"

Weiss smiled, "You wouldn't dare sweetie." before she picked up her gunblade and started walking with Jaune, Jaune sent a message to Ozpin explaining the plan. He didn't wait for a reply.

Hours later Ruby and her team with the addition of Blake and Velvet who had linked up with them were doing everything they could to simply survive the onslaught, over the last few hours they turned what was once a market square into a heavily fortified fire-based thanks to the skilled ingenuity of the combined huntsmen and vale army force.

Ruby scanned the horizon, with a look of discontent, the grim stopped throwing themselves at them about 45 minutes ago, and she didn't know why. "Pyrrha do you see anything?"

Pyrrha was looking down the scope of a borrowed sniper rifle. "I'll see a Grimm poke it's head out every once in a while, or a couple look like they were about to charge in only to stop before we get clean shots on them!"

Ruby shook her head and asked no one in particular "What the heck are the Grimm playing at?"

She didn't have to wait long for an answer. Without warning the Grimm began the onslaught again, when they did the came in a frighteningly organized manner. Rather than strike from all directions, the struck from two massive assaults from opposite sides. Ruby was forced to quickly gauge the strengths of the two Grimm hordes rushing her at once. "Huntsmen focus your attack on the flank to the right, it looks smaller but they have stronger Grimm as part of it. Soldiers hold off the diversion force attacking our left."

Ruby and her team led the charge in with the other six Huntsmen as they began doing everything the could to beat back the Grimm wave. Propelling herself with her Crescent Rose she got the scythe blade around the waist of a charging Ursa that came in half, before spin cutting through a second and third Ursa.

The rest of her team was doing their part as well. Blake used the ribbon of her weapon to trip up a pair of beowolfs that she dispatched, one by slitting its throat with her scythe blade, the other by shooting it in the head with the gun portion of her weapon.

Ren was practically holding off half the force by himself as a growing circle of dissolving bodies were forming around him as he intricately stood in a circle of them targeting grim in a fill 360 arc around them expertly taking them down one by one at range, or slicing up any that got in range.

Pyrrha and Velvet fought back to back, Pyrrha with her shield and spear and Velvet copying her weapon as the covered the others flanks and took Grimm down by the dozens, all the while Pyrrha screamed encouragement to Velvet who was just not listening long since given in to a silent rage for all the friends she lost today. Pity to any Grimm that entered their range.

Nora was making what Ren would call a glorious mess of things as she switched repeatedly between crushing Grimm with her massive hammer and popping grenades off from her launcher to break up the large groups.

Ruby However you see the tide of the battle, they were not in any immediate danger of being overwhelmed but they knew it was only a matter of time before they ran out of ammo, or the Grimm got lucky. As she took two several more Grimm with a low spinning swing of her scythe her she thought "All we can do is hope that we can get some reinforcements soon…"

Ozpin from his office was starting to feel a rare feeling of desperation, one thing he despised was not being in control of a situation. Still feeling anger at the loss of so many students and citizens it was taking a considerable amount of his patience to not catch the next bullhead to Vale and sort the situation out himself.

Throughout the radio chatter, one message caught his attention "Sir we have word of somewhere between 40 and 80 citizens all armed converging on the District 12 main gates!"

"Turn that up!" Ozpin shouted out to Port who nodded and obliged.

The radio chimed a conversation with two unnamed Vale army soldiers. "Confirmed, armed citizens are marching towards the district 12 gates, what are our orders?"

"Detain them, no civilians are allowed into the district!" Another voice over the Radio shouted out.

"Civilians are trying to get in there and fight the Grimm?" Glynda asked. "The situation is not that desperate yet."

"I don't think that's what's happening here." Ozpin mused out to no one in particular.

"You all need to stop, the Grimm are incredibly dangerous and the situation is not contained!" A Young vale soldier shouted out.

The Civilian group, mostly armed with Hunting rifles and various makeshift weapons marched towards the soldiers without showing signs of slowing down marched at them ina disorganized formation.

The Young soldier was so transfixed on this that he almost didn't notice the Beowolf that have made it through the lines and was leaping at the young soldier. The young soldier managed to turn and bring his rifle up just in time to see the Beowolf be stopped in midair shimmering in a purple glow. Seconds later the Young soldier looked on horror watching the Grimm as it was crushed into a rapidly dissolving sphere. The soldier turned to see a Purple scaled Dust eater with a sword on his hip walking towards the soldier.

With a mighty bellow, he shouted out his order. "Dust Eaters, engage the Grimm, secure the gate!"

One by one the Gathered crowd of civilians Shifted into their dust eater states and walked past the soldiers to engage the Grimm directly. Some burned Grimm to death with fire, others hurled lances of Ice or crushed them with shards of rocks or earth.

"Who's your commander?" The purple-haired Dust Eater asked of the soldier as a second shorter teal haired female dust eater packing what looked like some kind of Hybrid of a pickaxe and a short barred M60 machine gun.

The Soldier just handed The Purple-haired Dust eater who his headset to speak into. "This is Hector Arc of the Dust Eater Militia, we have come to fight with Vale, where are we needed?"

Ignoring the chaos that erupted over the battle net largely from Atlas soldiers who was expressing shock that an entire Dust Eater Militia was operating in the area. Before one voice gave a proper reply. "This is James Ironwood of the Atlas armed forces, we have Vale soldiers and Huntsmen in need of assistance in the market square, that's where you are needed. Welcome to the battle."

Hector nodded to the soldier and shouted out "Dust eaters rally on me!" He shouted as the Militia reformed up around him. "We march to the center and liberate the forces trapped in the market square!"

The gather Militia shouted out a fierce some Warcry as the started to march out into the thick of it. Hector turned to the Teal haired Dust Eater. "Saphron, cut loose"

Saphron smiled as she shouldered her weapon and thrusted out her hands creating two walls of Hard Light. Satisfied with the number of Grim she had in between the two walls clapped her hands together causing the walls to slam into each other crushing the Grimm she had trapped in between the Hard light walls.

Hector declared as he drew his swords. "Dust Eaters, We march to war!" As his host began to fight its way into the district.

Meanwhile, deeper towards the district Jaune and Weiss were closing into the area of the breach, through sheer luck they managed to evade the worst of the Grimm hordes and within eyesight of the Breach itself.

Jaune turned towards Weiss and whispered, "You ready?"

Weiss nodded and said back "Yeah, let's get this done."

Just as Jaune was about to step out he was grabbed and pulled back by Weiss who whispered: "Wait, look!"

Jaune took a second to look at the direction she pointed and he saw it, the biggest threat in the district right now, the thing that turned what should have been a disorganized and easily destructive swarm of Grimm and turned it into the massive threat the Grimm was in the district.

He saw the Grimmcaller, standing over 7 feet tall, covered in bleached bone plates, fully humanoid, and with its left arm ending in a massive crab-like claw. Jaune gritted his teeth and said. "Change of plans, we kill that thing first!"

Weiss nodded in agreement and they both charged out at it together...

So this chapter was a real pain in my ass to write for several reasons, I mostly was going back forth at the idea of bringing the Dust Eaters into the fight worried that even in the relatively small role they play here, that they might come off as "Oh his OC's are coming to say the day lol"

If I had them present from the get-go then I could see where that could come from, but as it stands they are coming in at the tail end of the battle, It's still going to be canon cast members doing the heavy lifting here after all.

I guess I'm coming into this chapter with a rather negative mindset sure. But I do want to address people that are commenting saying this story arc is going to long. I guess I can say is, I'm sorry you feel that way but this is the moment that diverges this story from canon and I'm going to let it take as long as it damn well needs to. I did straight up say at the start of it that it was going to be a long arc, and it was going to see a good number of named deaths. I'm going to change that now that I'm at most a couple of chapters from the planned end of it. If you wanted a nice safe fic, well I'm sure there are other stories out there to fill your needs.

As I said, I didn't really sit down with the greatest mindset when it came to writing it out so I hope it came out okay, but Hey, as always thanks for reading and I'll see you all next time.