This right here is what you might call a dream come true -- an illustration of my mainstay fursona of several decades, one Marcus Bowenford, drawn by the talented and legendary Crocdragon89!

Much as the case was with the illustration of the look-alike Garm that I uploaded in May of 2021, drawn by my buddy Brothen, I find myself nothing short of stunned at how good this looks. Everything about my boy is 100% accurate to how I imagined he would appear in Croc's style. The way he's built, the way his eyes look, his hair, the fluffiness of his tail, and even the colors and accents of his claws and paw pads are nothing short of flawless.

The most surprising thing about this, tho'? It was a gift!

I really should've suspected this was coming when he asked me for references, but at the time I thought he was just expressing a general interest in the character! I literally cannot thank him enough for this; to say that I love it and am appreciative of it and the artist who drew it would be a vast understatement!

What's more tho', he drew a series of alts to accompany it! Check these out ↴

- Undies

- Casual

- Casual (Alt)

- Work uniform

- Work uniform w/apron

Now, real quick, I'd like to take a moment to talk about those last two alternates which're cited as Marc in his work uniform. This wolf exists across a multitude of different continuities, some of which are similar to one another but many of which veer away from away from what you'd call "the norm" by truly outlandish degrees. But what I'd like to call the "prime version" of him exists in a contemporary setting shared with my very good friend, SergeantBuck.

In that setting, Marcus has been happily married to one of Buck's characters, Denise "Diesel" Reynolds, for (as of the submitting of this submission) the last nine years. And while the pair of them are often depicted in illustration as being insatiable sex fiends, the reality is anything but. Theirs is a very loving, frequently realism-based relationship. And one of the things that they've had to deal with since getting together and subsequently moving in together is Marcus' inability to hold a stable job for one reason or another. Denise doesn't mind supporting her husband, because her job at the Reynolds family business (which is modeled after the very real Binford Metals) is high-paying, but the wolf dislikes the idea of simply taking it easy and not pulling his own weight in the more domestic aspects of the relationship. And so he's gone from working at a used book store, to a Barnes & Noble, to a local rideshare company, before finally ending up at [a fictionalized and absurdly exaggerated version of] Ghost Alley Espresso.

The story of how he ended up there, after having been employed at Ryde (the aforementioned rideshare company) since 2018, following his being laid off from the Barnes & Noble workforce in 2018, is one of the more somber arcs that's occurred behind the scenes. In short? In mid-2019, Marcus' car was t-boned by a drunk driver while he was driving a client to their home on Queen Anne Hill. Although he and the passenger survived the collision, the inebriated motorist did not, and the wolf was incidentally admitted to the nearest emergency room with a leg injury that would subsequently see him out of commission for the next six months. And then the pandemic hit, and Ryde, which was already struggling to compete with the likes of Lyft and Uber, folded as a direct result.

To make a potentially long story short, Marcus remained unemployed and in a state bordering depression until things started to turn around in late-2021, after the vaccines started to roll out en masse and businesses began to slacken their stances on screenings and how many people could be allowed inside them at any given time. It was during the lead-in to Halloween that the wolf accepted what was originally only to be a temp job as a barista at the aforementioned downtown Seattle coffee shop. But as the weeks stretched on, and Marcus began to learn the trade and make friends with the quirky hole-in-the-wall's regulars, he negotiated himself into a longtime contract and has been working there ever since!

Thank you, once again, Croc, for these wonderful illustrations! I've been meaning to provide a summary of Marcus' character for the longest time now, and they were just the excuse I needed to do that! I hope to commission you in the near-future for more!

Marcus Bowenford ©

Illustrations by