Sins from the Past

Awards:

🥇 First Place in the Action Genre category of the Green Exchange Awards (2025)

🥈 Second Place in the Become Hooked Prologue Contest (2021)

🥈 Second Place Overall in the Green Exchange Awards (2025)

“It is most unpleasant work to steal bones from a grave, but what is the use, someone has to do it.”

~ Franz Boas, American Cultural Anthropologist in 1888

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August 1923

Cre-tae Tribal Reservation, California

Faust wiped the sweat from his brow, anxiety setting in. The weathered archaeologist squinted in the dim light flickering from the lantern the boy held high. This was taking too long and the last thing they needed was someone from the reservation happening upon their midnight foray among the sagebrush.

“Faster! We don’t have all night,” he growled at his pair of student assistants. His words dripped with the deep southern drawl several generations of Georgia lineage had bestowed upon him.

Both young men flung dirt in opposite directions as quickly as they could shovel, propelled not only by the professor’s anxious oversight, but by the tense atmosphere bottled up in the near pitch-black night. While the California desert air had cooled considerably, Faust’s apprehension provided him with more than a sufficient layer of nervous warmth. The only one who seemed to suffer from the chill was the lantern-holding seventeen-year-old, Emerson, who now wished he hadn’t begged his older brother, Michael, to come along.

According to the coveted information Faust had received from his highly trusted contact and his own extensive understanding of geography and human patterns, the Chief’s interred remains should have been right here. But his young laborers hadn’t found anything after over an hour of digging, and irritation blistered within him as time ticked on.

Surely, Albertson wouldn’t have given me misinformation. He spent four damn years prying it out of these hard-headed Indians. Please let this be the right spot. The archaeologist sent out a silent prayer, recalling the meeting he’d had last month with his long-time friend and colleague.

“I’m telling you Gregory, the remains have to be buried right here.” Anthropologist Ted Albertson had stabbed his finger on the carefully drawn map as the pair sat at a small local diner just off the Cre-tae reservation. “See this small hill? They’re always having ceremonies out there, but no one’s allowed on the south side. Old White Feather slipped up a couple weeks ago when I nonchalantly mentioned it and told me that ‘to go there would disturb a powerful ancestral ghost.’” At this, Albertson shoveled another bite of apple pie into his mouth.

“And you think that ghost is Red Rock?” Skepticism narrowed Faust’s gaze. He needed verification that the remains would be more than just some random old Indian. “We’re risking a lot going in if you’re not one hundred percent sure. This is federal land we’re talking about, and while generally no one would raise a stink, those Indians won’t take too kindly to the idea.”

Neither man wanted to be caught up in an Antiquities Act dispute with the tribe. Albertson drew his breath in through his teeth. “It’s Chief Red Rock alright. The last tribal chief to be buried in the traditional way before the tribe began interring members in the reservation cemetery, like the good Christians they’ve become. I’ll eat my hat if he’s not buried there.” Albertson tapped the top of his head, before leaning back over the table, circling a roughly thirty-square-foot expanse to the south of the marked hill with his chewed stub of a pencil. “All you have to do is figure out the precise location within this area. And for you, that should be a piece of cake.” He waved his hand with dismissal, then leaned back, raising the front legs of his chair an inch or so off the ground, watching Faust.

Faust had an immense amount of trust in the anthropologist who’d been documenting the Cre-tae tribe’s beliefs, culture, and social activities with fervency, like few others in the field. The secret of the renowned Cre-tae leader’s burial had been kept under wraps with success by the tight-lipped tribal members for nearly forty years. Albertson had taken just a handful to garner this much information from various tribal sources. Still, it wasn’t exactly specific.

He considered Albertson for a moment. Unlike himself, Albertson’s motivation for unearthing the Chief was pure and scientifically righteous. In his heart, the anthropologist believed such precious historic artifacts would be better off with the museums. They would be well preserved, cared for, and appreciated far better than in the hands of the tribe. People couldn’t learn from them if they lay in the ground, turning to dust. This mentality had him persevering in the field for so long. Faust agreed, but the fame and fortune involved outweighed the crusade to preserve America’s native past.

Finally, rubbing his neck with resignation, Faust agreed. “A sector of this size is something I can work with. I’ll find him.”

He had every intention of living up to that promise. Wetting his dry lips, then again wiping his brow with the back of his hand, he focused his attention back on the lads still digging below. Unlike him, they had the energy of the twenty-somethings they were, though Rick seemed to be dragging a bit now. Faust knew this excavation was beyond unorthodox compared to the formal digs Rick and Michael had participated in under his tutelage over the past year. It had to be surreal to dig such a hurried and sloppy pit, especially while being watched like a hawk by his strict superior—the one who taught that excavation units were meant to be squared off with precise measurements, lines, and layers, each exhumed with the utmost care to protect anything that might be harmed by a stray blow from the shovel or trowel. But those instructions were tossed to the wayside tonight.

“I don’t think it’s here,” the slender youth muttered, grimacing as he stretched his back and took in the roughly dug pit around him.

A little daunted by Faust’s annoyed expression and growl, Rick quickly picked up where he left off, chucking another shovelful of dirt over the edge of the pit, while Michael persevered on, paying neither of them any mind.

Within a matter of seconds, Rick had to eat his words as he struck something hard, making the metal of his shovel blade ring in contrast to the muted sounds he’d been producing in the soft, sandy soil. The pair of student excavators paused, excitement filling their faces, before tossing their shovels aside. Emerson inched closer, his apprehension swinging the lamp a bit too hard as he shone the lamplight further into the near three-feet deep hole.

A breeze from out of the blue rose up and ruffled Faust’s salt-and-pepper hair as he stooped with anticipation, hunching greedily over Michael’s shoulder from the edge of the pit. Running his hand over his mustache in concentration, he waited impatiently, while Rick grabbed his trowel and a brush from the edge of the pit to further uncover the object in question before dislodging it from its resting place. Flustered energy shook the young man’s hands as he worked, while all four of the archaeological raiders held their breaths, hearts pounding in their ears at the implications of their potential find.

Breaking the silence, a distant coyote’s yap alerted Faust to his surroundings, causing his nerves to twitch some. One of the reservation’s residents could show up unannounced at any moment. What about the old Indian who’d approached him while driving through the tribe’s government-obtained land two days ago? He’d brushed the suspicious tribesman off with a lie, but he’d caught the spry elder eying his rucksack and shovels in the bed of the Ford Model T.

As the half-moon appeared from behind the partial clouds where it’d been hiding all night, Michael gasped. The brilliant moonbeams not only enhanced the lamplight on the object Rick had finally extracted from the sand, but cast an atmosphere of magical awe. Faust’s heart raced as he hungrily gaped at the vivid-white artifact, ceremoniously radiating in the now bold moonlight, while two deep black holes seemed to stare back at him, and perhaps, he felt, even into his soul. “I found him! Chief Red Rock.”

Elation and relief spilled over the group.

Smugly grinning back at the perfect and intact skull, pride and ego filled him as he tallied yet another historic discovery in his near twenty-five-year career. Grasping the long-since decomposed head of the late Cre-tae leader, Faust’s mind raced, and immense greed fueled him with vivid sensations of power and excitement. The money wrought from selling the remains would allow him the funds to pursue other, even more difficult-to-obtain objects through further excavations across the United States, primarily on Indian land.

Running through a short list of the posh museums who might have scientific interest in his rare find, he couldn’t help but chuckle, smiling towards the night sky, while basking in his success. The Field Museum in Chicago, the Peabody in New Haven, and maybe even the Smithsonian Institute at the nation’s capital. All three were known for their immense hunger for the crowd-pleasing American Indian and all he represented in main-stream society’s eyes. These fine institutions sought everything from human remains to priceless sacred relics to educate droves of upper-class patrons. They desired nothing more than to feast their eyes on the past possessions of the exotic and dying breed of savages who once populated the land nationwide and were now confined to reservations on crap land no one else wanted.

These artifacts were becoming more difficult to obtain as the years passed, making their discovery quite essential to his repertoire. If the entire set of skeletal remains were indeed here, he thought, he could easily split the lot up between several museums, making not only a fair amount of money, but an even bigger name for himself in the scientific and museum communities.

But I don’t think I’ll give you up just yet, he silently told the emotionless cranium staring back at him. He had worked hard to make this discovery tonight and the skull would be his to keep, he decided, cradling it between his palms and gazing upon it for the rare and precious artifact that it was. It would make an excellent addition to his own personal collection of priceless artifacts.

Turning his attention to the burgeoning archaeologists blinking up at him from the pit in revere, he dabbed his kerchief at his neck, then took a moment to impart a bit of wisdom. “The number of chief’s skulls available for the taking is limited, and as I see it, the number of living Indians is sure to continue decreasing until one day there won’t be many left to fill graves for our taking. So, the amount a find like this will bring will only multiply drastically over time as they become more scarce. When I’m ready to sell, this skull alone could make me quite a bit of scratch. Learn everything you can about archaeology, boys, and maybe one day you’ll have your moments of glory and a bit of money to make it worth your while, too.”

The three young men looked on in fascination and both of the archaeological students swallowed heavily; the ramifications of their being here and what it could mean for their future careers dawning on them.

“Let’s go boys.” Faust finally stood, slamming his dirty, sweat-soaked Fedora back on his head and grabbing one of the burlap sacks from the ground behind him, carefully wrapping the skull inside. “Dig out the rest of him and let’s get out of here!”

In quick order the duo finished their task, filling in the hole as best as possible in the dark night. It was well after two in the morning by the time the group climbed into Faust’s truck, hefting the bag of decapitated human remains into the bed, nestled comfortably with their gear and a very cold and overwhelmed Emerson. The teen kept a hesitant watch from his seat against the truck’s cab as the vehicle bounced mercilessly over the potholed dirt road. The moon, retreating behind the clouds once more, basked the open desert landscape in darkness yet again, while the grave robbers, under the protection of the United States Government, took their treasure, leaving nothing but dust in their wake.