The Strangers in Moscow Codex (Author: Oculus) (Cover art by Carpdime)

Oculusfluffy · September 21, 2022, 3:01pm

The Strangers in Moscow Codex

Featuring art by Carpdime

What was supposed to be a one-off story ended up becoming a project that took a large chunk of my fluffy fiction wirting in 2022, becoming on the same level as Aww Staw Supah Fwuff and Wan Pway. This fic thus compiles all the links to stories that takes place in the world of “Strangers in Moscow”, as well as a summary and analysis of the key entities and concepts in the story.

~Links~

Inspiration from an alternate universe

Pre-Narrative

Strangers in Moscow

Post-Narrative

~

Premise and Conception

At the start of the year, I had been working on an attempt to do a hugbox alternative to @jberg360 s Fluffy Runner. While I had Jberg’s permission to use his characters, the task took a number of months as I had difficulty trying to figure out a proper approach to the story. The story was further complicated by the 2022 Russian Invasion of Ukraine, which had occupied my interest and thought process.

In the wake of the invasion, many western companies had pulled out of Russia. This sort of led me to consider a thought experiment:

“What if Hasbio left Russia?”

I had written “Be The One” from the Ukrainian side, imagining the characters of Fluffy Runner as being Ukrainians who would later support their efforts in auxiliary roles. But this also made me consider a companion story, one that explore the effects of the war on the Russian side. As someone who has had Russian friends, the war has adversely affected peaceful civilians on both side of the conflict.

So initially, I wanted to write a story about Hasbio leaving Russia, the way McDonalds left Russia. But there was a problem. While franchises like Ikea, Uniqlo and the like have also left Russia, it didn’t seem to have the same bite as McDonalds leaving Russia.

This issue seemed to reflect the problem with having Hasbio be so ubiquitous in the fluffy pony genre. While created as a parody of Hasbro, based on the idea that Hasbro got successful enough to have a bio-engineering division, the problem is that Hasbro, as a name, just isn’t catchy. When people buy Hasbro products like My little Pony, Transformers, Care Bears, Dungeons & Dragons and what not, they don’t say “we bought Hasbro stuff”, they say they bought the respective toy/game franchises. But McDonalds? Now that sounds like a name anyone could use to refer to a product. The same would apply to any product from Disney.

This story ended up having a lot of research, because it opted to provide a develop a different origin for Fluffy ponies with McBrega being the stand-in for Hasbio. It also became an opportunity to explore some recurring themes within fluffy pony stories, but in a different manner.

Key Concepts

McBrega

Inspiration: McDonalds, Sega and Hasbro. In addition, Nintendo, Disney and Chuck E Cheese

The stand-in corporation used for this setting, McBrega had its origins as a fluffy “lab + café” ran by the McBrega Brothers. Each of the three brothers had a different background – Henry McBrega had encountered the pet café concept in Taiwan, Maurice “Mac” McBrega worked with animatronics in the Afton’s Automat in New York, and Irving McBrega was a scientist working on bio-animatronics. The three came together to start a restaurant that manufactured bio-animatronic fluffy ponies, based on a fluffy that Irving had acquired from Fievel Belyaev’s farm.

Eventually, they hired Will Kroc, who expanded the company, and eventually bought it over. Under Kroc, the McBrega corporation initially switch over to “naturally born” fluffies, with mills being developed to produce as much stock as possible. This would later be reversed when Irving’s son, Roy, would join the company, and slowly move the company towards using “manufactured” bio-animatronic fluffies.

In SiM, the average McBrega’s outlet can be imagine as functioning like a cross between a Chuck E Cheese outlet, a McDonalds outlet, and a pet café.

OOC: I have been somewhat critical of the over-reliance on Hasbio in much fluffy pony fiction. It initially made sense as parody and satire when the fluffy fandomw as still within the MLP fandom it 2012, as it worked of the unexpected popularity of MLP:FiM. One could imagine Hasbio as a dark satire of Hasbro that churned out cheap copies of base MLP like that one episode of Powerpuff Girls. However, and when the fluffy pony fandom branched off from MLP, this reasoning made less sense, especially in the wake of art and stories that tried to depict fluffies in a more realistic (though graphic) manner.

In addition, a criticism I had with over-reliance Hasbio is that, more often than not, Hasbio is portrayed negatively. This may be due to fluffies being treated as an invasive species in most canons, or an over-reliance on depicting Hasbio as a cold and calculating mega-corporation. While the latter makes sense, it makes it harder to explore the idea of “Hasbio leaving Russia”, because such a departure would be lauded by the populace. In addition, and because Hasbro itself is not a catchy name, a name like McBrega’s, being the MacDonalds of this setting, would sell the idea of “freedom and the free market”.

I had been thinking of writing a story covering the rivalry between the Belyaevs and the McBregas. It may be one of the last stories I do for this particular setting.

Fancy Dandy Horses and Fluffies

In this setting, the silver fox domestication project took place a 100 years earlier in the 19th century, due to advances in genetic engineering occurring over a century earlier. Thus, the Dmitry Belyaev of this setting looked towards engineering a new form of house pet, that being a more domestic version of the dwarf pony that could be raised at home. These animals became known as “fancy dandy horses” and experienced a period of popularity during the Victorian Era, before being forgotten.

Then, at the turn of the century, the Belyaev family split into two, due to a part of the family converting to Judaism. That part of the family was also interested in developing the fancy dandy horses as a “talking pet” which squared against the decision of the other family members. Bringing their stock to America, this Russian-American part of the family slowly developed fluffy ponies as commonly understood, which later became more widespread thanks to the influence of Will krock and the McBrega Corporation.

Dendies

Inspiration: Dendy

Dendies refer to any of the native breeds of fluffy ponies that originate from the breeding program in Russia. Although the stock in Russia was bred without the focus on being able to develop humanlike speech, this changed when word of the popularity of McBrega and its fluffies reached Russia. This led to Soviet intervention with the fancy dandy breeding programme, with the horses rebranded as “Dendies”.

However, and despite looking vastly different from their American counterparts, Dendies can breed with American fluffies.

OOC: One of the major influences on the fluffy fandom was its discovery on 2ch.ru, which led to many Russians joining Fluffybooru. Their designs, however, differed so much from the more MLP-ish nature of the artists prior to it, with some examples being Artist-kun, Egoralexeev and Shaferaraks. In addition, Russian artists and users became known for being very abuse-centric as well as causing drama, with one of the famous tiffs being that between Santanon and Abuse-Sir. It is a reason why a reference to Russian users is made on @mutagen 's Fluffybooru Advisory list.

Bioports

Inspiration: Bioports from eXistenZ, R.O.B. the Robot

An invention of Roy McBrega’s that was later implemented in fluffy ponies sold by McBrega as a result of their entry into the Console War. Th bioport can be understood as an electronic port located on the back of a fluffy pony. A cable can be attached from any McBrega appliance into the fluffy pony, allowing the fluffy to be able to participate in the game. More advanced versions of the hardware allowed the fluffy to experience a form of virtual reality.

Initially, these bioports were electronic based, and were “grafted” onto the bodies of fluffies, but over time later research allowed for the creation of more biological based bioports, which came naturally with the body of a fluffy as a sort of growth. These “growths” could be passed down to progeny, as seen in the case of Sinyaya.

OOC: One criticism I’ve had with fluffies is that, as toys, they’re horribly limited due to their needs.

The bioport, thus, is my attempt to imagine a manner that fluffies could becoming possibly popular as a form of toy. According to the Gaming Historian, R.O.B. the robot had contributed to the initial success of the NES in America, as people wanted to buy the console “for the robot”. The bioported fluffy of this setting can be imagine as an improved and far more effective version of said robot.

Bio-animatronic

Inspiration: Animatronics from Five Nights at Freddy’s, Replicants from Blade Runner

Animatronics used for entertainment existed earlier in the history of this setting, and people instead starting researching into more biological-based animatronics. The living teddy bear of Princeton was one of the earliest bio-animatronics made, and Irving McBrega based his life and work on bio-animatronic fluffy ponies.

OOC: I had previously written the story of Bio-Lathe, which was a depiction of a fluffy pony being custom-made. Fluffies have often been depicted as being programmed “androids”, but the problem of this depiction is that fluffies are also depicted as being capable of sexual reproduction.

One of themes that interest me in fluffy fiction is the dichotomy between “fluffy pony as toy” vs “fluffy pony as animal”, and where the blurring of the lines really exist. I still see naturally born fluffies as “animals” and not toys, but a “manufactured” fluffy with a bioport would be a different story.

Marty McBrega

Inspiration: Ronald McDonald, Miles Tails Prower, as well as Sonic the Hedgehog and Mickey Mouse

The mascot of McBrega’s, Marty McBrega was based off Will kroc’s own pet fluffy, Martin. Over time, there was a focus on breeding fluffies that resembled Martin, which led to problems such as in-breeding, and animal rights violations. Eventually, when Roy McBrega took over, the DNA of the original Martin was used, and subsequently most Marty McBrega fluffies that are sold at McBrega outlets are custom-made fluffies that are cloned from the original Martin owned by Will Kroc.

OOC: While adapted from a picture that Carpdime drew, I also went with Marty being based of Miles as Stranger in Moscow is widely believed to be based off a song that MJ created for the Sonic 3 OST.

Red Or Blue

In the world of SiM, Michael Jackson as we knew him didn’t exist. However, his song “Black or White” did exist, but was a song celebrating the end of the Cold War.

Darwin/Mendel

In the world of Strangers in Moscow, Charles Darwin and Gregor Mendel were born 100 years earlier, and had collaborated together. Their discoveries led to the development of genetic engineering of two centuries earlier, as well as led to advancements seen in the setting of this story.

OOC: In a paper on the subject, it was cited that, had Darwin met Mendel, many discoveries in genetics would have been made much earlier.

A bit off-topic, but I like to imagine that the kind of collaboration that Darwin and Mendel would have gotten involved in would be similar to the kind of shenanigans Raju and Bheem had in SS Rajamouli’s RRR.

Oculusfluffy · September 21, 2022, 3:04pm

With one part of Strangers in Moscow left, decided to make this post as an index of links of the stories set in the world of “Strangers in Moscow”. At the current moment I’ve only focused on concepts, and entities, but I plan to update this entry in future to include the dramatis personae of the stories.

Thanks has to go to @RoseTea for the creation of the McBrega name, @Mr_Owl for his help with the Russian language, and @Carpdime for allowing me to use his art, as well as giving me lots of support while working on this writing project : D

All that’s left now is to work on the finale to Strangers in Moscow. shudder