I gloved, spread a sheet across the table, and emptied container two. It took several minutes to locate and remove the two loose dental restorations. After sealing those items in a vial, I picked out al jaw and tooth fragments, placed them on a tray, and set it aside.

Then I turned to the skul .

There would be no reconstruction for this guy. The fire damage was too severe.

Teasing off charred flesh and flaky black gunk, I began working my way through the jigsaw puzzle of cranial architecture.

A segment of frontal bone rol ed down into a pair of prominent brow ridges. Occipital pieces showed bulbous mastoids and the largest neck muscle attachment I’d ever seen. The back of the guy’s head must have bulged like a golf bal .

The rear-seat passenger had definitely been male. Not that useful. Larabee would nail that during his post.

On to age.

Taking two steps to the right, I studied the tray of dental fragments.

Like plants, teeth send roots into their sockets long after the crowns have sprouted through the gums. By twenty-five, the garden is in ful bloom, and the third molars, or wisdom teeth, are complete to their tips. That’s a wrap, dental y speaking. From that point on, it’s dental breakdown.

Though the passenger’s enamel was either missing or too crumbly to evaluate, every viewable root was complete. I’d need X rays to observe those hidden in the sockets.

I returned to the cranial wreckage.

As with dentition, skul s come with some assembly required. At birth, the twenty-two bones are in place, but unglued. They meet along squiggly lines cal ed sutures. In adulthood, the squiggles fil in, until the vault forms a rigid sphere.

General y, the more birthday candles, the smoother the squiggles.

By stripping blackened scalp from the cranial fragments, I was able to view portions of suture from the crown, back, and base of the head.

The basilar squiggle was fused. Most others were open. Only the sagittal, which runs from front to back across the top of the head, showed any bony bridging.

Though vault closure is notoriously variable, this pattern suggested a young adult.

On to ancestry.

Race is a tough cal at any time. With a shattered skul it’s a bitch.

The upper third of one nasal bone remained in place on the large frontal fragment. Its slope downward from the midline was acute, giving the nasal bridge a high, angled shape, like a church steeple.

I swapped the piece of forehead for a chunk of midface.

The nasal opening was narrow, with a rol ed lower edge and a tiny spike at the midway point. The bone between the bottom of the nose and the upper-tooth row dropped straight down when viewed from the side. The cheekbones bal ooned out in wide, sweeping arcs.

The steepled nasal bridge, sharp inferior nasal border, and nonprojecting lower face suggested European ancestry.