Oliver Wood

Statistics

Full name: Oliver Duncan Wood.

Nicknames: A few select people get away with calling him "Ollie". To his eternal embarrassment his mother still calls him "Muffin".

Age: 27

Date of birth: December 18th 1975

Blood: Half-Blood

Wand: 11 ½ inches,Oak, robust/rigid, Dragon heartstring core.

Alumni: Gryffindor.

Affiliation: Magical Law Enforcement/Ministry of Magic. Auror.

Home Life

Mother: Fiona Wood-McCaine: Muggle-Born. Hufflepuff Alumni. Happy housewife with a fondness for gossip and trashy romance novels; enjoys being a mother and grandmother but lately both her and Andrew are beginning to feel their age. Loud, cheerful, overprotective.

Father: Andrew Wood Pureblood. Hufflepuff Alumni. Former Quidditch player (Chaser for the Montrose Magpies); an injury put an end to his career which led to a self-imposed exile in the Scottish Highlands. Gruff exterior with a heart of gold. Has an opinion about everything and never hesitates to make that opinion known. Loudly.

Siblings: Moira Jones-Wood: Half-Blood. Squib. Oliver's beloved older sister (by four years) who lived most of her life in the Muggle world though she knew about the existence of wizards. Met and married Matthew Jones shortly after school. Has a son called Angus. 'Disappeared' during the Second War.

Other family: Brother-In-Law - Matthew Jones: Muggle. Worked for a software company near Nottingham. Married Moira. Father to Angus. 'Disappeared' during the Second War.
Nephew - Angus Jones: Half-Blood. As of yet it is unknown whether he’s a wizard or not. Son to Moira & Matthew. Five years old. Lost his parents to the Death Eaters which left him traumatized. Has recently come to live with Oliver's parents in the Scottish Highlands.

Oliver's grandparents on both sides are deceased and he has no contact to Matthew Jones family.

Pet: Bludger: Oliver's owl who has a slight identity problem (hence its name).

Home: Oliver resides in a moderately large store-house turned flat in Oaklane, near Limehouse basin [London Borough of Tower Hamlets] It might not be the most elegant residence, but it's really cheap and he's hardly ever home, anyway.

Finances: Middle Class. He gets by, though he can't afford too many luxuries. The money from his Pro-Quidditch days was used to buy the lands surrounding the Wood's house in Scotland, which is currently inhabited by Oliver's parents and his nephew.

Personal Life

Personality: Reliable, enthusiastic, solid, dependable, almost stupidly reckless (especially when it comes to sports), a bit shy when talking to people he perceives as more intelligent then himself, has a great 'physical IQ' meaning that he's able to learn movements very quickly (that pertains to sports as well as to wand movements) and has a great control of his body like any person who does a lot of sport has, can be a rigid and ignorant in his views, fanatical about Quidditch, very introverted about his private thoughts but extroverted (perhaps too much) about Quidditch, values fair play very much and would rather loose a match then cheat, has very high morals, tends to go into denial over things he doesn't like.

This fixation on fairplay and a very compassionate and caring nature ultimately provided the motivation for Oliver to quit professional Quidditch and become an Auror, for as much as he loved his sport – even Oliver couldn't play Quidditch and live a good life while knowing that all around him people were dying.

Superficially Oliver Wood is the well-known Quidditch fanatic who lives, thinks and breathes Quidditch. He truly loves that sport and can hardly think of anything more fulfilling (and often forgets that other people might think differently). Quidditch is the one thing he's truly good at and gives him a feeling of stability and security in a reality that's sometimes quite confusing and troubling. Oliver uses Quidditch as a form of escapism or as a 'security line' whenever he feels insecure. This behaviour makes him seem far more obsessed with it then he really is and earned him the reputation of a Quidditch fanatic in the first place. On the other hand Oliver is a very private person when it comes to things pf a more personal matter. Hardly anyone knows that there's a side of him that loves art and painting, or enjoying a good book in front of the fireplace or that he can get very insecure at times (especially when it comes to things that don't involve Quidditch or his profession).

Having grown up in a house that was in a constant danger of falling apart, Oliver has learned a variety of useful little spells to repair things. Currently this little hobby manifests itself in his secret dream of developing the best racing broom ever. So far all his experiments have resulted in explosions that forced him to return to the drawing board to start from scratch one. However, Oliver is nothing if not persistent.

Even after graduating and playing Quidditch professionally for some years and then working for the Ministry, Oliver is still characterized by his boundless energy and enthusiasm. For everything he does. He either loves something or he hates it. Oliver is the most caring and compassionate of friends or the most passionate and fierce adversary.

He’s also fiercely protective of the people he cares about, i.e. his family but also his former Gryffindor Quidditch team or the Weasley family which he perceives as part of his own extended family.

Marital status: Single.

Sexual Orientation: Quidditch-sexual. No, actually he's heterosexual.

Strengths: Brilliant Quidditch player, thinks very strategically which makes him rather good at his job (that way of thinking was learned in years of devising Quidditch strategies), loyal friend, brave, compassionate, enthusiastic, reliable, solid, dependable, almost stupidly reckless.

Weaknesses: Overprotective of people he cares about, sometimes a bit narrow-minded, stubborn, tends to ignore problems in the hope that they'll vanish if he doesn't pay attention to them for a long time, shy when talking to people he thinks are more intelligent then he is, can be a rigid and ignorant in his views, tends to get stressed when he has the feeling of losing control, almost fanatical about Quidditch, very introverted about his private thoughts but extroverted (perhaps too much) about Quidditch.

Boggart: Oliver suffers from claustrophobia. Consequentially his Boggart represents a dark room with no means of escape, no windows and no way to spread out his arms (which is the minimum of room Oliver needs before panicking).

Patronus: A badger, representing aggressiveness, passion and drive.

Mirror of Erised: Oliver sees his whole family alive and well. Somewhere in the background his mum and Matthew argue about the proper way to make a good steak, his dad is talking to the as-of-yet unknown wife Oliver wants to have one day while Oliver himself teaches his nephew how to play Quidditch, supprounded by his friends (especially his former Gryffindor Quidditch team) and their progeny.

Amortentia Potion: The leather of his Keeper's gloves and protective gear. The smell of autumn in the Highlands, consisting (among other ingredients) of grass, sheep and the smell of Bruce's (the family dog's) wet hair. Something spicy Oliver hasn't been able to identify as of yet but it reminds him of the Gryffindor common room.

Aesthetics

Appearance:Oliver Wood is a typical, 6,1" tall, burly ex-Quidditch player with well-trained muscles and broad shoulders. However, years of practising sport have ensured that his movements are very fluent and controlled and he moves with more grace then one would expect from him. He has calloused hands and usually wears a bright, manic smile – especially when flying. He used to smile more often but lately he finds smiling harder and harder to do. Due to some of the fights he's been in Oliver has several scars (some deeper, some more superficial) all over his body – however, that’s nothing strange in these times. Ever since the battle of Hogwarts Oliver walks with a very slight limp (right leg). Fortunately, that limp does not keep him from flying.

Oliver has warm hazel-green eyes and brown hair that’s in a constant state of disarray and a bit bleached by the sun since he spends as much time outside as possible.

Height: 6'1" [1,85m]

Weight: 178 pounds [81 kg]

Hair: Brown. Short. Practical. Usually in a state of disarray as he's still flying as often as possible.

Eyes: A muddy mixture between green and brown. To his extreme embarrassment Oliver lately requires reading glasses.

Style of dress: Oliver is pretty much immune to style and prefers a comfortable mixture between Muggle clothing (he has this fondness for jeans) and classical Wizard wear (formerly of the Quidditch gear variety, lately he is known to prefer wide robes over his Muggle clothes – because they have so many pockets he can fill with all kinds of stuff (and later forget about it)!).

History

Pre-Hogwarts

Oliver was born near Inverness in the Scottish Highlands to Andrew and Fiona Wood. His father used to be a great Quidditch player for one successful season (where he met and married Muggle-born Fiona McCaine) until a stray Bludger shattered his shoulder beyond repair and abruptly ended his career as a Chaser. Driven into depression by the ending of what he deemed his life, Andrew retreated into the Highlands with his family in order to keep away from all things Quidditch-related and live a peaceful life. Her husband’s bitterness with his fate almost drove Fiona away and for a time the newly-weds went through a rather rocky phase.

This, however, was overcome with the birth of Moira, who was followed four years later by Oliver.

Hogwarts-Experience

The first year of Hogwarts combined the greatest of bliss (Oliver learned more about Quidditch and – even though he wasn't allowed to participate – attended every training session as an annoying mascot of sorts) as well as the greatest torment (he wasn’t allowed to have his own broom or participate in Quidditch). It was also the start of Oliver's great rivalry with Marcus Flint whom he detested at first sight. Oliver learned that he very good at remembering movements (which came in handy with all the swishing and flicking in Charms) and very clumsy at more theoretical subjects, such as Potions, which led to severe suffering and many detentions.

Finally, in his second year, Oliver's dream came true and he joined the Gryffindor Quidditch team as a Keeper. This led to a rapid drop of his grades and after a long, stern – and quite frankly terrifying – talk with Professor McGonagall Oliver included a new routine into his life: regular mid-night learning sessions so he wouldn't be suspended from the team. Quite coincidentally, that turned Oliver into a reasonably good student but the insecurity from his first year remained: Oliver thought of himself as stupid anywhere but on the Quidditch pitch. This insecurity haunts him to the present day.

Oliver became Quidditch captain in his fourth year and spent most of his free time on the pitch which led to the curious fact that he never even noticed girls until one day one of them asked him to accompany her to Hogsmeade on Valentine's day. It's needless to say that he annoyed her to no end and the whole date ended in a fiasco but the damage was done – Oliver was now aware that girls attended Hogwarts and that made him nervous. So he did the thing he deemed the safest – he focused on Quidditch and tried to ignore the problem. However, this became increasingly difficult during his fifth and sixth year which led to a few superficial flings that were usually broken up by the girls because they couldn't stand his prattling about Quidditch any longer (which he used to mask his insecurity).

In the holidays before his last year the Woods were visited by an old friend of the family who coincidentally turned out to be a professional Quidditch trainer who immediately recognized Oliver's talent. However, instead of encouraging the young man, the trainer pushed Oliver through an afternoon of intense professional training to see how Oliver would hold up. Our favourite manic Quidditch captain barely held his own but the sheer stubbornness impressed the trainer and – still not hinting at his true intentions – he told Oliver about dozens of things he needed to improve if he ever wanted to survive at Quidditch.

Oliver, quite naturally, took this as a challenge and spent his 7th year either studying for his N.E.W.T.s (in the nights) or following a rigorous training schedule set up by the Quidditch trainer. After his great triumph of finally getting the Quidditch cup and surviving the N.E.W.T.s the Woods were once again visited by the Quidditch trainer who told Oliver that he had a tryout with Puddlemere United. The rest is history as they say.

Post-Hogwarts

Oliver played as a reserve Keeper for Puddlemere United for about one year before becoming their regular Keeper in 1995. Due to the fact that Oliver sacrificed his personal life for his career, he rose pretty quickly in fame and popularity and for about two years he lived the dream he'd had ever since he was a young boy. With his tendency to ignore problems until they cannot be ignored any longer, Oliver successfully failed to notice the growing threat of Voldemort and focused instead on his career. During that time he had some meaningless flings that never grew into anything because no woman ever came close to meaning as much to him as Quidditch. He was, for a time, extremely happy to play Quidditch every day and do his best to teach Angus all kinds of nonsense.

Summer 1997 - Present

The death of Dumbledore in June 1997 shocked Oliver out of his little Quidditch-filled world and finally forced him to realize that not everything was well and that he couldn't just ignore problems in hopes of making them disappear that way. Still unsure of how to react, Oliver nevertheless made sure that his parents, both too old to get too involved in the war and longing for some semblance of security, were protected by any wards known to him. He tried to provide the same kind of safety for his sister and her family but they refused, leaving Oliver not a little frustrated. However, his attention was still divided between knowing that "something needs to be done" and the fact that he spent most of his time practicing Quidditch.

To his shame Oliver had to admit that it was only in 1998 when the attacks increased dramatically that Oliver had no other chance but to realize that things really were hopeless. He suddenly realized that his own family was in danger. In addition to that Pro-Quidditch was cancelled and Oliver suddenly found himself unemployed and with no means of escape to take his mind off things when reality got too rough. Naturally he had to find a new outlet for his overflowing energy and driven by his sense of justice he quickly embraced the opportunity the Ministry offered by entering the new Auror-program. The whole experience (while very satifying also being quite dangerous) in that program left him with a few insignificant scars (it turned out that learning to evade Bludgers had been a good training to evade curses, too), a lot of frustration about the lack of Quidditch in his life and a tiny little bit more maturity.

His life had barely come to a routine of sorts when in Septemer 2000 the news that his sister and her husband have disappeared reached him in the middle of a mission. Oliver was, of course, very shocked and in consequence it was a matter of pure dumb luck that he survived without any substantial amount of damage.

Angus Jones, Moira's little boy was sent to Oliver's parents who took care of the 'orphan' during the war.

Still, the loss of his sister brought a dramatic change in Oliver's point of view. No longer did he want to work in 'Homicide' but quickly set his sights on 'Disappearances' in order to find some closure and actively continue doing his very best to bring Angus' his family back. Despite the fact that due to the chaos of war the Ministry was forced to abandon the search for Oliver's sister and her husband, the Scot himself could never bring himself to do so as well. Life, however, didn't allow Oliver the time necessary to dwell too much on this as the war went on and – as an Auror in Training and then, from 2002, a full-fledged Auror - the former Gryffindor was quickly dragged into the middle of the battle.

It was only in late 2003, after the war had ended, that the Wizarding World was granted a respite and Oliver used that welcome break to help clean up the mess left behind by the war; namely: continue investigating the 'disappearances', in hopes of bringing the victim's families closure, as he could understand their feelings only far too well.

Currently Oliver is content having an opportunity to help and to actually make things better – which is the best therapy for his own losses the Scot could ever wish for. However, just as he has come to the resolution that life is going well again, bodies are found and people disappear again.

Timeline

· 1970: Andrew Wood and Fiona McCaine meet, fall in love and marry after a whirlwind romance. Later that year (Oktober) Andrew's shoulder is shattered and they re-locate to the Scottish Highlands, in a small Wizarding community near Inverness.

· 1972: The crisis in the Wood-household reaches its boiling point but Andrew and Fiona overcome their differences. Moira Wood is born in November.

· 1976, December 18th: Oliver Wood is born. He spends his early childhood in the Highlands and his magic abilities manifest at the age of ten, whereas it becomes apparent in 1982 that Moira is a squib.

· September 1988: Oliver starts Hogwarts. He is immediately fascinated with Quidditch and hero-worships Charlie Weasley.

· 1989: Oliver joins the Gryffindor Quidditch team. Slytherin wins the House Cup.

· 1991: Oliver becomes Quidditch Captain in his fourth year and wins new talents for his team such as 2nd years Angelina Johnson and Alicia Spinnet (reserve) and Fred and George Weasley.

· 1992: Moira meets and marries Matthew Jones in a whirlwind romance reminiscent of the one her parents had years ago. The couple moves to Nottingham. The following year Angus is born.

· 1994: The Gryffindor team wins the Quidditch Cup and Oliver graduates. Later that year (early August) he signs up with Puddlemere United as Reserve Keeper.

· 1995-1997: Oliver becomes regular Keeper for Puddlemere United and after some rather sobering experiences he learns to live up to the pressure that comes with the job. Oliver remains ignorant of the growing tension in the Wizarding World.

· June, 1997: Dumbledore is murdered and Oliver is shocked out of his little Quidditch-filled world. He decides that something needs to be done against the Death Eaters. He does, however, remain mostly passive.

· July 1997: His parents' house in the Highlands is protected by heavy wards but Matthew refuses to have his house charmed.

· April 1998: The British Quidditch League is disbanded. Oliver, suddenly unemployed, is angry enough to decide to take follow the call of the Ministry and enrolls in the new Auror program.

· April 1998 to 2000: He gets into several tight spots during that time but manages to make it through that time relatively unharmed.

· September 2000: Moira and Matthew disappear. When Angus, who is at the kindergarten at that time, waits for his parents to pick him up that day, he does so in vain. Several hours later a hysterical Angus is fetched up by Andrew and Fiona Wood. Oliver, frustrated with the fact that his sister and her husband remains among the missing, reconsiders his career choice and decides to make a specialization in "Disappearances".

· 2002: Oliver finishes his Auror-training, his private investigations to locate his sister still fruitless. However, the stubborn Scot refuses to accept her death until he sees the body. Oliver gets partnered up with Thaddeus Bradley, a senior Auror, and starts officially working in the Sub-Department "Disappearances" while, more often than not, being called to support the Ministry in their war against Voldemort, leaving many of Oliver's cases neglected.

· 2003: After the great earthquake Oliver, along with most other Aurors is forced to take a break from his regular work and help rescuing the survivors. Shortly after, Oliver spends almost no time trying to solve his cases but mostly fights the Death Eaters, surviving the whole experience more or less unscathed (due to a combination of sheer luck and Quidditch-honed reflexes).

· Late 2003 to present: In the aftermath of the war Oliver returns his attention to find out more about the people who disappeared, simultaneously trying to bring the war criminals to justice and give the families of the victims closure.

Current Activities

Odyssey should put something here