Picture the flag on a pirate ship. What do you see? A grinning skull and bones crossed in an ominous “X.” These bones are always gleaming white. But have you ever thought about how they got that way? Those pristine bones used to be wrapped in sheaths of muscle that moved them around, skin and hair that protected them. This episode tells the story of how a living, breathing organism turns into a pile of bones, and how those bones can tell us about the lives they led hundreds, or even thousands of years ago.