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reds-skull · 3 months

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Revenant Side Stories:

Story I: Konchar

[Main Fic] [AO3]

I am back! Still drowning in uni work... but I wanted to get this out of my brain first.

I had a few ideas for oneshots for Revenant AU, from the POV of other characters, expanding on events detailed in the main fic and leading to part 2.

At this point it's obvious I'm going to write part 2 (I have too many nice ideas for it haha), but I think I'll do the new AU first, since it will probably be shorter and I'm excited about it rn. While doing that, I'll add more side stories. I already got a few ideas, but if you want to see someone specific, you can suggest them!

Now, let's get to Konchar's story...

Four soldiers lay motionless on the cracked pavement of Verdansk, the British flag on their tacvest almost blending with their blood.

Konchar wipes his brow. The air is much warmer here than he remembered. It’s been only a few months since he left, since he deserted his country for an ultranationalist Russian. He breathes in deeply, the settling dust from the short battle coating his lungs.

It was far too easy to kill the Brits. None of them were Revenants, and so all they had were guns and bullets. Those stopped working on him since he died.

Konchar examines his surroundings, looking for the fifth. He remembers well what Makarov has told him, the words etched in his mind with burning fear.

“Go to Verdansk. An SAS Squad has been tasked with bringing you in, but they do not know your revenant status.” The man held Konchar close, an almost gentle touch to the way he clasped his neck and pulled him closer, if not for his next words.

“One of them will be a revenant, and he will try to kill you. You must kill him first, Kirill. It is imperative for our goal that the British revenant is dead.” The hand on his neck tightens, and Konchar’s gaze fleets to Makarov’s eyes, their flat and dead quality sucking the air out of him.

“Do you understand?”

“Yes, Commander.”

Konchar pushes off the ground, looking back at the broken bodies he left behind one last time. They’re but a necessary sacrifice for a greater good, he tells himself. He has no doubts anymore, not since he began working under the Revenant of Fate himself.

Makarov knows best.

He searches methodically, the area not unfamiliar to him. This part of the city is mostly abandoned, underfunded construction projects left unfinished after one of the many economical collapses in Kastovia sunk its claws into his country. They have suffered far too long, with the world turning a blind eye.

As per Makarov’s orders, other Konni group soldiers wired a huge amount of explosives in one of the many crumbling buildings, a trap that Konchar initially thought failed when he heard the detonation going off while he was fighting the Brits.

He’s once again proven wrong, to ever question Makarov’s insight. Perhaps the bombs have taken care of the revenant for him. Still, he must confirm the kill.

The ruins are still burning when Konchar reaches the building, and he squints at the bright flames. No one can survive that, unless they have a supernatural immunity.

A trail in the dry earth catches his attention. Brown-red blood mixed with the dirt, tilling through like someone dragged themselves away from the devastation. Konchar flexes his hands, feeling the broken concrete answer to him and follow his will.

He walks along the path, winding around broken walls, until he finds a man, and he freezes.

The man has yet to notice him. Laying on the ground, he grasps at the cracked asphalt with torn fingernails, heaving and shaking. Seems like he didn’t have an immunity after all, perhaps a healing power of sorts.

It matters not. Won’t save the revenant now.

Konchar almost takes pity on the man, and decides to pull out his pistol. He barely uses guns anymore, but he kept this for sentimentality, of all things. It reminds him of a time when he still belonged with living beings.

He takes a step closer, and the man sharply turns. Bright blue eyes, bloodshot and open wide, stare at him.

“You… you did this?”

Konchar tilts his head, “the explosion? One of my colleagues.”

The man lowers his gaze to Konchar’s pistol, “and… my squad?”

The safety clicks off, “Mine.”

The soldier stares down the barrel for a single moment, before lunging at Konchar with a growl.

“YOU FUCKIN’-”

Konchar shoots his head. The body crashes back down. He lets out a breath he didn’t know he was holding.

His gut churns. Something feels… wrong. How did the soldier know his squad was dead?

He sighs, turning to leave. He can ponder it over on the flight back, for now, he still has to extract and relay to Makarov that the revenant is dead.

Ribbons appear out of thin air and bind him in place. Konchar frowns at them. If they’re here, that means his Reaper-

“Not dead not dead not dead NOT DEAD.”

Konchar barely swings around before the ribbons pull him forward, and from the edge of his vision he can see…

The revenant, hands bursting with fire.

An animalistic scream tears through the air, and for the first time since he was alive, Konchar feels unadulterated horror.

Konchar grasps at the concrete chunks he trailed behind him, flinging them at the rage-full soldier.

The man sneers, clawing his way through them, hands leaving charred remains as they explode the ruins to dust. Konchar has to scramble back when they swipe at him, barely getting out of their way.

The air around them burns, each inhale he takes scorches his throat. In the back of his head, Konchar knows he can win this fight. This man is no different to the tanks, the jet fighters, the armies he felled.

And yet, his body screams at him to run away. Just please, run far away.

But Makarov rings through his memories, and Konchar remembers he is a soldier, the most powerful revenant of the East.

And this man cannot be allowed to live.

Konchar drags his arms forward, bringing with him an avalanche of iron and stone and dirt, burying the unnatural flame of this hellish revenant.

But the soldier continues to burn, shatter, decimate all in his path.

That is fine. They’re in a forest of buildings. Konchar has enough ammunition to destroy dozens of revenants the likes of him.

He cannot lose this fight.

His arms burn. Not from fire but from his own powers. Pain shoots through his veins in a spidery web, in a way that would paralyze a weaker man.

Konchar started losing confidence as the minutes trickled by, as the world around him looked less and less like the city he used to know, and more like hell. And if this is hell, the revenant in front of him must be the devil himself, reigning over the broken land.

Konchar throws another building at him, only for the soldier to wave it aside as if it was nothing. The explosions blind him momentarily, and then they’re back at it, Konchar walking backwards, throwing anything he could get a grasp on, and the soldier stepping closer, eradicating and destroying.

They have moved far enough that they’re close to the inhabited parts of Verdansk. If this goes on…

Konchar cannot imagine this man stopping after he wins against him. If Konchar dies, who says he won’t continue? Who says he won’t turn the entire city to his own hellscape?

No, this is an uncontrolled force, a rabid dog. He must be put down.

Yet, Konchar feels his power waning. No one else would stand a chance against this revenant. He needs to finish this, now.

Feeling at the closest building, he knows what he must do. Even if it pains him greatly to inflict this on his own people. Konchar prays they understand, in the life after this, why he had to. Why this is the lesser of evils.

Konchar snarls and drags a spasming hand, lifting a residential building, feeling the hundreds of beating hearts race within as they yell.

He screams at the revenant, “IF YOU DON’T STOP THIS, I’LL KILL ALL OF THEM!” his face twists, voice cracking, “YOU’RE NOT GOING TO LET HUNDREDS OF INNOCENT CIVILIANS DIE, DO YOU?!”

The world slows for a heartbeat, as the revenant stills.

For a heartbeat, Konchar feels victorious.

And in the next, the revenant charges at him, an inhuman shriek breaking through his throat.

Konchar, on instinct, blocks the monster with the building.

He feels dozens of bodies break in an instance, wails suffocated by ruin, living beings silenced and cut short.

Wide eyes, Konchar can only stare as this… beast tears through human lives as if they were dirt under his feet, uncaring of their pleas.

“You… You… Monster…..” he mutters.

Something within Konchar breaks. What he’s fighting against can’t be reasoned with. This is not a soldier with honor, a revenant with a reason, a man with faith.

This, this is a horror. Destruction personified, the darkest pit of human nature.

He grabs another building, desperation boiling over as Konchar swings another set of people to certain doom. He silently begs any Reaper watching for an answer, a way to defeat this demon.

How, how could he win?! How else could he fight, how do you put out this never-ending fire?!

Tears start tracking down his face, his chin wobbles as he hears screams choke and die. He can’t do this anymore. He can’t lead any more lives to slaughter. His body is tired, he is tired.

And so, Konchar lets go.

The revenant rushes forward, path no longer blocked, and Konchar feels a strange calm washing over him.

As the monster sends its burning palm to his head, Konchar is almost glad that it will be over soon.

At least, he can rest. He won’t have to live in the same world as this beast.

Perhaps there is some humanity left to him, as Konchar’s heart twists. No, he won’t have to share a world with him, but everyone else will. And what kind of world can this devil bring, if not one of total chaos?

No. He can’t die here, to this demon. The world’s fate is on his shoulders, he MUST kill him.

“You can’t you can’t YOU CAN’T” a voice echos in his mind.

He begs, “Reaper… please. Lend me more power, let me defeat him. For the sake of the world!”

“I care not for it I care not for them I CANNOT HELP YOU.”

“Please-”

“Our deal Kirill OUR DEAL IS DONE.” his Reaper screams, “DEATH HAS COME. WE HAVE NO EARS FOR YOU NOW.”

“NO! REAPER!!!-”

As fingers curl around his skull, Konchar can feel his powers leaving him, the gift he received being pulled away.

And he remembers distant words, a false prophecy. Makarov is never wrong. It was not this revenant that was destined to die here, he realizes.

As fire brightens his vision, Konchar shuts his eyes.

And he curses, Makarov and Reapers and this monster, for letting him die.

As his skin breaks, and flames lick his bones, Konchar exhales.

And he mourns the world.

That it has to live with this man.

His head hurts, is the first coherent thought Soap can remember. It’s a sharp sort of pain, as if someone is scraping at it from the inside.

He blinks around, confused. Ruins and flames surround him. Where is he?

As Soap takes a step forward, his boots hit something. He looks down and jumps back when he understands what it is.

The body is so mangled, Soap didn’t register it at first, limbs thrown in odd angles, and its head…

Gone.

“What…” Soap mutters, automatically bringing a hand up to brush at his hair before stilling.

His breathing picks up when he watches fire dance around his fingertips, yet it doesn’t burn him.

A moth, radiant and otherworldly, lands on his outstretched hand, and Soap instantly remembers.

Bombs, explosion, Reaper. His squad, dead, him, reborn for the sake of revenge. Konchar, the bullet, and-

“No…” Soap blinks, turning around, hyperventilating.

The world stares back, broken and bleeding. In the cracks and rubble, in the remains, a message is carved for him.

“This is your doing. This? Is your fault.”

“No…!”

The flames on his hands grow bigger, twin lights of the inferno around him.

“NO!”

Soap yells, but no one answers. There is no one left to answer.

He begs and cries. He pleads to the Reapers.

“Please…not this… I didn’t… want this…..”

But his calls are left unheard.

In the hours to come, a squad will come find Soap, as they search for the missing team.

They will find no one else, nothing else but a terrible cradle, made of debris and dust, of innocent blood and splintered bones.

The birthing place of the Revenant of Destruction.

#call of duty modern warfare 2 #cod mw2 #cod soap #john soap mactavish #kirill konchar bogomolov #revenant au #call of duty fic #call of duty fanfic #call of duty modern warfare #cod fic #cod fanfic #this wont make sense unless you've read the main fic!#so if you dont feel like reading like 68k words feel free to skip this one lol #kirill my beloathed... if only you didnt listen to makarov man #this was fun to write bc i got to show how soap's enemies view him #a horrible monster :)

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techav · 5 days

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More Speed, More Power, Pretty Pictures

I added some crude functions to the ROM monitor on my Wrap030 project to read the root directory of a FAT16-fomatted disk and load binary files into memory to execute. This opens up a new option for developing programs and running them on the computer, and makes it easier to keep programs on-hand for loading when I demonstrate the computer.

So what new program do I build first for running from disk? The same Mandelbrot renderer I've been using all along, of course! All I needed to do to get it running from disk was adjust a few load instructions to use PC-relative addressing and then change the vasm output to raw binary.

It ran without issue ... mostly. I had been noticing some instability with the system in general. It's not really related to the programming work I've been doing, it just tended to show itself more when doing the kind of FPU-intensive processing required for the Mandelbrot program. Sometimes the system wouldn't boot at all, sometimes it would continually reset. Other times it would run fine for a while, but randomly throw a coprocessor protocol exception (especially when using double- or extended-precision floating point values).

I had a pretty good idea of where this instability was coming from ...

As someone on Discord put it, that's a pretty little antenna I've got there.

High speed computers don't like excessively-long wiring between components. I made the ribbon cables long because there were other boards I developed for this system. But, I'm only using the CPU board, the FPU + IDE mezzanine board, and the video generator board. All that extra wire is just making things more difficult.

A year ago, when I first put these three boards together, I had to bump the bus speed down to 25MHz to get it to run. I could run the CPU board up to 56MHz by itself, and I could get it to run with one expansion board or the other up to 40MHz, but with all three boards, 25MHz was the best I could do (out of the oscillators I had on hand). I have some 33MHz oscillators now, and while I could get it to run sometimes, it was obviously far more unstable.

It was time to trim those pretty little antennas.

I left room for one more card, in case I can get my DRAM card working later, but trimmed a few inches off. The result? Rock solid at 25MHz now.

... and at 32MHz.

... but 40MHz still doesn't run.

I am quite pleased with that result. My target for this system in the beginning was 25MHz. That extra 30% speed increase is very noticeable, especially when running a program like the Mandelbrot renderer.

But I had a thought.

My FPU is rated for 25MHz, and here it's running solid at 32MHz along with the rest of the system. But my FPU board was designed to support the FPU running at a separate clock speed from the rest of the system (the 68881/68882 FPU is actually designed to support this, so I implemented it when I built my mezzanine board).

What would happen if I tried running the FPU even faster? Perhaps using that 40MHz oscillator that I couldn't use for the complete system?

Surprisingly, not a problem running the CPU at 32MHz and the FPU at 40MHz.

... or 50MHz

... or 55MHz

... or 67MHz!

Once again, I've run out of faster oscillators. This computer is running stable with its FPU clocked at over two and a half times its rated speed.

The video above is a real-time capture of the VGA output of this machine running that Mandelbrot renderer (now modified to use 96-bit extended-precision floating-point arithmetic!) with the CPU & main bus clocked at 32MHz and the FPU clocked at 67MHz. Some frames take minutes to render. Some complete in as little as seven seconds.

I am in awe. While I had big dreams when I first started working on this project six years ago, I never could have imagined it running this well at that kind of speed. I am very happy with how this project has turned out so far, and can't quite believe I actually built something like this.

I typically wrap up these posts with a plan of where to take the project next, but the project has already exceeded my expectations. There is so much it is already capable of now that I have a permanent storage option available. I guess I could try getting that DRAM card running to expand the main memory beyond 2MB, or try adding a keyboard and some text routines to complement the video card. Both are good options towards getting a proper operating system running, which has always been a goal of the project.

Either way, I'm sure I'll have fun with it.

#wrap030 #mc68030 #homebrew computing #retrocomputing #mandelbrot #motorola 68k #motorola 68030 #homebrew computer #assembly programming #motorola 68882

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