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SUN-FIRED SOIL CRUNCHED under Nel’s boots. It was almost surprising when there was no vandalism. Perhaps they stayed out late the night before, and were too hung over to trash her site. She opened her field book, changing the partners around. She glanced up as Mikey's shadow fell over her. “Alright, get Henri set with those two units, then I want you running the total station for this.”
Mikey rolled his eyes. “I’ve got to re-calibrate it, but it’ll be ready when you are.”
The battered yellow case of the total station was something more common for DOT road surveys, but it was worth its considerable weight in platinum. Nel started doing the walkover, eyes glued to the ground. The sounds of hard earth and metal and the buzz of insects were a favorite song. She never grew sick of it. The western end of the site was normal enough—the roughly semi-circular layout faced south-east, toward the river and backed against the windbreak of the hills. It was the eastern part that bothered her. She frowned at the unusual landform. It was too flat and too straight for anything natural, even a flood. Besides, it would have flooded west, into the ocean. Instead, it widened to the east, a great flat, long funnel.
She paced along the northernmost edge. It was bordered by rocks, large ones that would have been hard to move. As if the landform wasn't odd enough. She sketched the rough shape of the wall, following it until it petered out several hundred meters away from the site. She turned around, stepped a few paces from her last path, and walked back. Walkovers were meditative and having real eyes — not a camera or a fly-by’s aerial shots — was always best. The human eye saw things nothing else would. On her first survey, someone found a point—rich black obsidian with a green vein. The knapper had shaped it in a way that made the green run straight down the center of the point. Humans were nothing if not artistic. If she liked the shape of a hill, it was likely someone fifteen thousand years before would have too.
“Nel, all set!” Mikey jogged over with the total station pole—a red-and-white striped staff with a prism set at the top. It looked uncannily like a wizard’s rod from Magic the Gathering.
Mikey handed it to her, his features schooled into practiced sobriety. “With great power, comes great responsibility.”
Nel grinned at his quote and took the staff. One day she would figure out how much of their conversations were just repeated annually. She guessed more than half. “I’ll write the points, you record the coordinates, K?” When he nodded, she headed to the nearest corner and planted the steel point at the top of the first rock. She stared absently at the level bubble. She could do this in her sleep. She moved down the line, choosing the largest rocks or those from non-local sources. It took two hours to record the entire formation, and by the time she was done, her eyes hurt from the sun and her crew had already taken lunch. She trudged back and perched on one of the boulders at the side, copying Mikey’s coordinates into her field book.
She stared at the drawing, brows knotted and half of a smashed sandwich forgotten in her hand.
“Nel, we’re packing it in, you good to go?”
She glanced up. “What?” The sun was low and the crew looked as tired as she felt. “Shit, yeah sorry.” She tossed her tools and the paperwork into her pack and pulled herself back onto the jeep. “You got the finds?”
Mikey nodded. “Got some good ones today. Might even be some diagnostics in there.”
She grinned. “That’s what I like to hear.”
•
THERE WAS A THIRD UPSTAIRS bedroom, across from the bathroom, that held the artifacts and maps, anything too precious for the Jeep or the site. Finally clean, and with a cold beer in hand, Nel pulled out the day's bag of artifacts and propped the door open with a brick. A tiny portable speaker muttered out Shing02, and Nel upended the bag over the desk. Every level of every quad of every unit received its own bag for chipping debris. Nel went through each, washing the smooth stone and re-bagging it. It was tedious work, but meditative and something she preferred to do alone, or at least without conversation. She washed the chipping debris and placed it into a cataloging box. Only the tools were left. Each had their own, double bag, complete with a packet of soil. Tools were diverse across location and time periods, and much could be determined from their shape and material.
The advent of microscopes, however, had brought a slew of new information. Tiny nicks on the edge of blades and points, invisible to the naked eye, could determine the material on which the tool had been used. Protein analysis would tell, sometimes within a genus, what meat may have been cut.
Granted, if a crewmember touched the tool, analysis would be just as likely to pick up their own protein or that of the roast beef sandwich they had for lunch. Many of the tools weren’t pretty — fragmented or of poor-quality material that degraded easily. The crew found two point types on the site. The first was the broad fishtail, the other Clovis-style fluted points. The second had a channel knocked from the center of the base to help wedge the stone into a split spear shaft. The combination of the two wasn’t common for younger sites, but Nel grinned. This site is old, then. The controversy of Monte Verde made any archaeologist leery of ambiguous data from the region, but Nel was confident this site wouldn’t cause any paradigm shifts.
Someone knocked softly and pushed open the door. “Hey, Dr. Bently, can I talk to you?”
Nel glanced up. Annie stood in the doorway, shifting from foot to foot. “Of course, everything OK?” Nel was no stranger to crew drama, but it was not high on her list of favorite things. She reached over and paused her music before leaning back in the chair. “What’s up?”
Annie perched on a chair opposite her. “I’m kind of worried about the looting. And I don’t know what to do with my career.”
“Those sound like distinct issues.”
“I guess. Maybe. The first class I took with you, I decided I wanted to be you when I graduated. Like, I wanted to run my own site and all. But with the looting and seeing how angry it makes you and how you handle things, it makes me think I couldn’t handle the same thing.”
Nel frowned. “That’s flattering, Annie, thank you. I think your worries are good concerns to have at this point. Archaeology isn’t an easy field. We snipe at each other, it’s a small world, and burning bridges is very easy. The hours are long and the travel is tough and the weather can suck. What is your favorite part of this job? Is it the learning or the digging?”
Annie shrugged. “I guess the digging. I like working outside and I like the methodical work and the idea that we’re allowing people to know more. I mean, school is great, but I don’t ever want to teach.”
Nel grinned. “You're done with classes. All that's left is your thesis. Try CRM—cultural resource management. It's all digging and no teaching. Many places will take you with just an undergrad, so you'd be golden.”
“I just don’t know where to start.”
“Tell you what, let's get through this season. When we get back I'll make some calls. I know people who might need help on their crews.” She watched Annie’s face a moment. “Is there anything else bothering you?” When the girl shook her head, Nel pushed a bag towards her. “I’ve got some artifacts from yesterday that need washing and cataloging. Wanna help?”
Annie grinned and scooted closer. “Do we have to listen to angry Japanese rap?”
Nel snorted, “No, but whatever you put on damn well better not be Top 40.”