About Darac Marjal

If you don’t know who Darac Marjal is, please read my FGA first. Some of that information is repeated here, but read that first please.

Background

Darac Marjal is an inhabitant of the planet nOriglos. nisabE (the only intelligent species on nOriglos) are anthropomorhic reptiles. This means that they walk upright and are sentient, like humans. Darac is a fighter pilot in the Peace Alliance, an interplanetary army fighting the Na’Leksa. He is currently assigned to 318 squadron and the cruiser tala’Uthos. During quiet periods he can often be found on Earth, a planet he is rapidly growing fond of.

Genesis

Darac kind of has had two beginnings. He first started as a character in a Science Fiction novel I’m writing. He wasn’t anyone special in it, just another fighter pilot in the squadron at the focus of the story. However, when I was at university, I came across a culture known as furry. As I became a part of the ‘Furry fandom’, I felt I needed a character to play online (in fact, for the role-playing games, I needed one). Almost at random, I chose Darac and used that name in place of my previous nicknames: Londo Mollari, Zaphod Beeblebrox and BugblatterBeast. One advantage over those nicknames was that Darac was my own character and I could control him that much better. I had been caught out a few times by more knowledgable fans asking me questions about my namesake that I couldn’t really answer.

Because I had settled on a single, unique character, I was more able to make a definite online presence. No longer was I just another devoted fan, pretending to be some obscure character. I was Darac Marjal, a unique entity. Now Darac has become virtually my only identity on the internet. Many people know me as Darac. Hence, when I was looking to update this website, I decided to buy the domain Darac.org.uk.

IRL – In Real Life

At the start of 2001, I was a member of a mailing list called NorthernFurs. This was a point of contact for all the furs (well, those that were aware of it) in the North of England. There are various “What is Furry?” sites around the ‘net but, briefly, a fur is someone who has some connection to anthropomorphic animals. This is a broad classification for a broad community. The connection can be anywhere from enjoying Cartoons animals and drawing them in your spare time, through a strong attachment to a character used for role-playing etc, all the way up to belief that one’s human form is the character and the animal is the “real you”. Anthropomorphic means “possesing human qualities”, be this a normal animal with the power of speech and rational thought, a human with some animal qualities (e.g. eagle eyes, cheetah speed etc.) or the more common bipedal animal (similar to a human, but fur-covered and with the animal’s head, paws, tail etc.).

Furry has been described as a “meta-culture” in that it can pervade many other activities. Furs are into role-playing, comic book collecting, writing, drawing/painting, sports, music etc. There has been a certain amount of coverage in the media about the sexual aspect of being furry but, as usual, these stories have been exaggerated to provide sales. Not every fur has a stuffed animal (a plushie) with which to act out their fantasies, not every fur can only have sex while dressed from head to toe in fur. These extremists are, like in any culture, the exception rather than the rule.

Anyway, I was a member of the NorthernFurs list and considered myself a fur-fan. That is, one who enjoys furs but doesn’t make it part of their lifestyle. Around the start of January, there was discussion of a meeting of NorthernFurs in Manchester. I was in Preston at the time and, as it was a Saturday and I had nothing else planned, I decided to go along. I figured “OK, I don’t really know what these people are like, but if I feel I’m not fitting in, I can always leave and come home.”.

However, it turned out that they were very nice people. Many of them were students and, after a slow start to the day, we were soon all getting along well. One of the tenets of being furry is tolerance, and the furs I met that day were welcoming and friendly.

On that day I introduced myself as Darac and since then I’ve always been known as Darac. In fact, I now answer just as readily to Darac as I do to Paul.