The kingdom's wall is open. A massive, gaping hole in the most vital defense. Reconstruction is incomplete, the work of months yet to come.
The patrols have somehow failed. The wilderness is not sufficiently tamed, the guardians are scattered to hunt false signs in all the wrong places. The great fire that swept through the slums has filled the city with the scent of sorrow and despair; darkness calling out to darkness.
The Creatures of Grimm burst onto the site, howling and baying for blood.
They are answered with the roar of mighty combustion engines, the scream of tires and tracks, the ear-piercing bellow of vehicular horns, flying bullets and bolts of energy, and defiant human war cries raised in one voice.
Bulldozers and front-loaders charge into the horde first, smashing and cutting with their blades and shovels. The backhoes and cranes follow cautiously behind; wherever a Grimm moves to flank the front-line vehicles, a scoop or a wrecking ball swings in to knock them back.
Men and women cling to the outsides of the steel machines, for there are too many volunteers and not enough room in the cabins. Secured to the safety bars with ropes and straps, they hold pistols in one hand and hammers, wrenches, or pipes in the other, firing into the beasts of extinction and hollering their courage. They beat the hulls of their mounts with their makeshift clubs to drum out their battle rhythm, and strike the bony masks that come too close.
In the rear center, dumptrucks race about. In the back beds, human and faunus laborers stand side-by-side, lashed together with straps and ropes that threaded through the metal loops of the truck-bed so that they can remain on their feet as their drivers maneuver them about the battlefield like mobile artillery platforms. Armed one and all with every rifle on hand, they wage war upon the Nevermores diving from the sky.
In passenger seats, the foreman and his aides shout instructions and information amongst each other through the radios, coordinating the efforts of their people. Flanking movements are spotted, openings are closed, targets are marked.
Drivers call upon years of experience controlling their machines like parts of their own bodies. Cranes and front-loaders wield their arms and toothy heads like living creatures, lashing and biting. Bulldozers dash and spin like children's bumper cars; two smash an Ursa Major between their shovel-heads, while a third smashes a charging Hoary Boarbatusk off-balance so that a fourth can catch it right in the ribs.
It is hopeless.
Monstrous hide undeterred by rifle-fire, a Giant Nevermore lands in the back of a dumptruck and feasts on the trapped, screaming souls within. The driver sees it happen in his rear-view mirrors and hears the confirmation over the radio, but knows he can do nothing. Denied his pitiful artillery, the driver turns his steed to the front lines and charges forward. He aims for an infant Goliath advancing on a front loader, and dies from the head-on collision. The beast is stunned long enough to get caught in the engine's following explosion. Black smoke takes to the wind.
Beowolves of all sizes leap upon the construction vehicles, pulling the exposed volunteers off the sides in whole or in pieces when they don't devour them on the spot. Drivers and cabin passengers shoot through the windows, for the glass would offer no significant protection anyway.
An adolescent Goliath coils its trunk around the arm of a crane and pulls it off its tracks.
A Hoary Boarbatusk hooks its tusks under a bulldozer's shovel and a heave of its mighty neck rotates the machine onto its side.
An Ursa Major catches a wrecking ball to its chest with massive paws, winded and injured but holding the weapon firm as its younger brethren swarm the helpless machine.
One by one, Dust-fueled engines are primed and unleashed to take as many beasts with them as possible.
No one retreats, except to fight for one more second. No one questions their purpose, except in the inescapable panic of helpless last moments. They fight to the last soul.
One and all, the men and women die.
Triumphant and flush with bloodlust, the Grimm advance upon the wall. But they break upon the anvil of the militia forces who assembled thanks to blood-bought time. Soon after, the huntsmen and huntresses arrive like the hammer, smashing the monsters with the fury of their shame and sorrow.
The horde is broken. The city is saved. The survivors gather the dead.
It is a dark day in Vacuo's history, but she will never let her kingdom forget the brightness of the light that refused to fade quietly.
She sat in the darkness of her study. The only light, the monitor which played the footage she has watched a hundred times before, this time every year.
Gentle hands covered her eyes. "That's enough, Kagari. It's time to come to bed."
Kagari brushed Yomi's arms off with the whisper of nightgown sleeves sliding against each other. "I'm not tired."
Her friend brought her arms back around Kagari in a loose hug, resting her chin on Kagari's shoulder to murmur into her ear. "Yes, you are. You're halfway to passing out, but staring into the bright screen is keeping you from feeling sleepy. You've got a hard day tomorrow, and you need to rest."
Yomi seldom stood taller than the heiress of Izuriha Heavy Industries, but Kagari was sitting down. She leaned back into her childhood friend's embrace, letting the faunus girl stroke her hair. "I am doing the right thing, right, Yomi?"
This worried Takanashi Yomi, for Izuriha Kagari did not, as a rule, ever second-guess herself.
"You know you are. The Heroes Of The Open Wall will be exactly the monument of honor that you envisioned. Children and adults of all ages will play this game in the arcades and in their homes, and they will appreciate the struggle of those who gave their lives for them."
Kagari fought tears. "I just... I just don't want to make a mockery of it. It needs to be fun. It needs to allow the possibility of victory, however slim. It really can bring respect to the blue collar construction profession, perhaps even train future drivers and militia men who might have to defend themselves the same way."
Yomi subtly rocked her friend back and forth. "I know it was hard for you to listen to that woman's words while the lawyers talked sense into her. I know you hurt for her loss. I know you aren't trying to profit from the blood of brave men and women. She may never come to see it that way, but I'm not alone. We know why you're doing this. The council's censorship board wouldn't have fully endorsed your project if they didn't feel that you were acting in the best interests of the kingdom."
Kagari sighed, but said nothing.
"You've fought long and hard for this, Kagari. You're just too tired. I promise that everything will seem better in morning, but for that you need to come to bed and sleep."
The blonde wiped her eyes and smiled. "Where would I be without you, Yomi?"
With an impish smile, the brunette replied, "You would be fighting to stay awake at the ceremony tomorrow, shivering with too much caffeine and sweating under the make-up hiding your eyes' bags and bruises. You would be so miserable as to taint the joy of your achievement. But you would stand as strong and confident as ever, a queen marching to the future."
Kagari giggled a little, in a girlish way that she showed only to family. "The future." She stood up from her desk, and linked their arms together.
And she vowed. "The future that I will build.
"I will crush the Grimm, Yomi. Beneath my wheels and my feet and my steel, I will crush them all. I will build a new world out of steel and souls, and darkness will learn to fear our doors and our courage. That is our future."
Omake: Kagari and Yomi Act Naughty
It was late at night when good little girls should be quietly asleep in bed, but Kagari's personal chambers echoed with an electrical buzzing noise and the sound of Yomi screaming her name.
With a wide, toothy grin, Kagari continued to slowly and deliberately stroke the vibrating tool back and forth.
"Kagari! Kagari! Kaaagaaariiiiiii!"
Rolling her eyes, the blonde heiress finally decided to show a little mercy. She switched off the motorized toothbrush in her hand and spit into the bathroom sink before calling to her locked bathroom door, "Yes?"
"Let me in! You've been in there for an hour and I need to go!"
"Well, maybe you shouldn't have called me fat."
"I called you a brat, which this behavior is not disproving!"
Kagari switched the toothbrush back on with a sing-song of "Can't hear youuuu~!"
The door suddenly sprouted two new horns, before abruptly vanishing into splinters.
Being rich meant never having to sweat a little property damage. Being friends meant never having to say you're sorry.