haven | application

[jeez]

Name: Heather
Contact Info: heather.roleplays [@] gmail.com & heatherberry
Other Characters Played: N/A
Requested apartment: N/A

Character Name: William "Bill" Oswalt
Canon: Fargo (TV)
Canon Point: Episode 9, "A Fox, A Rabbit, and A Cabbage"
Background/History:

(SPOILER WARNING) Here, but since that's a Wikipedia entry about the whole show, I'd like to focus it a bit more: Bill is from the small and normal Midwestern town of Bemidji, Minnesota, where things were, for the most part, quiet — up until January of 2006, when people started getting killed and the town almost went to Hell in a handbasket courtesy of a mysterious out-of-towner and a local man who decided he'd had enough of being treated like dirt. Aside from the fact that said out-of-towner may literally be the Devil, there is nothing supernatural about Bill's world save for some instances of strange coincidence.

Personality:

Not too long ago, Bemidji's former (now late) Chief of Police said of Bill Oswalt, "Bill cleans his gun with bubble bath." Though the truth of this statement is never revealed, it's... likely. Maybe.

Bill's a Good Guy. Senior police deputy turned Chief, Bill loves his job and the town he serves (which he's lived in almost all his life) and has a very Midwestern attitude about things: He believes in community, in faith, in government, and in Right and Wrong. He wants nothing but the best for the citizens of Bemidji and as their Chief tries hard to keep things in order, to keep things calm, and to keep everyone happy. He's thoughtful and sensitive, a little bit goofy, and those traits show in how he interacts with and cares for his colleagues — limited though those interactions may be, since Bill doesn't have all that much screen time.

He's also a family man. Bill has a wife, Sally, whom we don't see, but we do meet his and Sally's foster son, Tahir, who is from Sudan. There's no implication that he and Sally have other children, and when Bill relays the story of how he literally found Tahir in a supermarket after there had been some kind of mix-up with what sounds like the adoption agency.

But his emotions can get the better of him in that they sometimes blind him. When his childhood friend, Lester Nygaard, becomes a suspect in his wife's murder as well as the murder of the former Chief of Police, Bill almost flat-out rejects the notion. This is what clouds his judgment throughout the rest of the series, as he continually actively denies that Lester could have had any involvement because, as he said, "Lester wouldn't hurt a fly." However, later on, Lester is brought into questioning when his young nephew was taken into custody for bringing a gun to school (which Lester had actually planted in his backpack, thinking the backpack belonged to his brother — not his brother's son), and Bill is visibly upset and shaken by the events that have transpired since the first episode. He says:

"I don't even know where to start. It's like, when you see on the news, a boat sinks in India and three hundred people drown and you ask yourself, 'Do I know three hundred people?' or — one of those African massacres with twelve-year-olds with machetes and they kill — you can't even count that high. We lost sixteen people in 1920 to the flu; I looked it up. In '78, six people died in a pharmacy fire. But nothin' like this. Ever. Three people murdered in two days, including the Chief of Police. Lenny Potts missing, and a cop shot. And now a kid brings a gun to school."

In that same scene, Bill expresses a feeling of betrayal to Lester, noting that Lester could have come to him as a friend with the marital issues that (Bill believes) led to Lester's wife's death. He's also somewhat exasperated, having discovered that Lester was fudging the truth a bit during the initial investigation, which plants a seed of doubt in Bill's mind regarding Deputy Solverson's claims. This only makes him reject them more vehemently, though.

Bill only became Chief due to his seniority; he's not really fit for the job. Though his heart is in the right place and he tries hard to do his job as well as he's able, he doesn't possess many of the leadership qualities needed for such a position. There is something of an air of authority about him, but it almost seems forced. When he's in his office with his feet kicked up on his desk, relaxing like everything is fine and he owns the place, his secretary/assistant is usually standing nearby handling business for him.

He does things his own way and is usually convinced that's the Right Way and also the Only Way. The way he continually dismissed the evidence gathered by Deputy Solverson is good evidence of that — because it went against what Bill and the others believed to be true about the case they (and the townsfolk) desperately wanted closed, Bill couldn't accept it as possible truth. Bill wanted to keep the case closed because it gave him and the town peace of mind, so it's clear that he didn't even consider what Molly said for more than just long enough to have heard her out and then shut her down. It isn't until two FBI agents come to town a year after that case was marked closed that Bill saw he was, unfortunately, wrong: The agents praised Deputy Solverson for her work and said they were impressed, which left Bill standing slack-jawed and clearly unnerved — because him being wrong meant he let a killer go and put the town — the people he's supposed to protect — in danger. Bill doesn't seem to have much of an ability to look past the surface of things, to see beyond what's obvious. Now that his eyes have been opened much wider, though, that could change.

Also, although he doesn't seem to lack bravery, he does have quite a weak stomach and is prone to nausea when near crime scenes where blood is present.

And he enjoys fishing.

Abilities/Powers:

Bill has firearms training and likely knows how to physically apprehend someone, though canon does not show him doing so at any point. He's otherwise a pretty average guy with a bad haircut.

Items/Weapons: His gun, police standard issue; handcuffs; handie-talkie (portable police radio).

Sample Entry:

[video]

[Sitting opposite the camera is a man in a beige police uniform, gray-haired and gray-mustachioed, looking awfully worried and tired all at once. He keeps shifting back and forth in his seat like he can't get comfortable, alternating between looking to his side and then back at the camera.

Finally, he speaks. With a thick Minnesotan accent:] Hiya. Wasn't quite sure how to work this thing, but — here I am. The name's Bill Oswalt —

[A pause, brief and barely there.]

Uh, Chief Bill Oswalt. Bill'll do just fine, though, seein' as I don't have jurisdiction in these parts. [Wherever "these parts" are, he thinks.] I'm from Minnesota, in case that wasn't obvious.

[He chuckles, albeit halfheartedly. C'mon, it was a joke. Some humor to lighten things up. Yeah.]

So... anyway, uh, I was wonderin' about the current state of law enforcement here, since it looks like I might need to keep myself busy for a while, and helpin' enforce the law is what I'm best at. So just — just lemme know. Thanks.

Sample Entry Two:

Bill's had nightmares like this before. He'd wake up in the middle of the night, turn over to wrap his arms around his wife, and mumble the details to her: "It was the darndest thing, Sal..."

But the town he'd dreamed of never looked quite this bad. He'd dream of Bemidji, just empty and a little old-looking. It was more upsetting than anything, something that made him sad — not scared. His blood never ran cold the way it is now, and his heart certainly never tried clawing its way into his throat. Those dreams were so benign he'd even hesitate to label them true nightmares, but Sally had insisted that that's what they were.

He wonders what Sally would think about this.

For a few moments, he just stands there, stiff. He knows his training taught him otherwise: you should anticipate. Be alert. Be vigilant. Move. What he does instead is survey his surroundings as much as his eyes will allow while he tries to remember how to use his limbs, and that's when he sees the billboard there on the periphery of his vision. He finally moves then, turning to read the text, and it leaves him grabbing in a panic for his gun while simultaneously trying to radio one of his colleagues.

But his radio is dead, and he can't still his hands long enough to actually get the weapon out of its holster.

Something tells him that what he just read is a load of baloney. Gas masks don't really inspire a sense of safety — if anything, he'd almost guess that the people who lived here once upon a time might not have believed what that billboard said, either. Maybe they didn't get the masks in time.

Or maybe the board went up after —

After whatever happened here happened.

"Jeez," he whispers to himself. "Jeez."