Nastas

Nastas is a minor character featured in Red Dead Redemption.

Background
Nastas is a Native American. He was raised on a reservation, where he attended school. Nastas is openly critical of government policy, and also, the criminal response of his fellow tribesmen joining Dutch's Gang. He is initially an informant for the Bureau of Investigation, under Edgar Ross. It can be assumed that he agreed to infiltrate the gang in an attempt to "rescue" his tribesmen from their certain destruction under Van der Linde's leadership.

Interactions
John is told that Nastas has arranged for Dutch Van Der Linde to be present on the Wreck of the Serendipity, for John to capture. The meeting turns out to be a trap, Nastas having been beaten and tied to a chair in Van Der Linde's stead. John and Archer Fordham rescue him, escaping alongside Ross in an automobile.

Nastas is later seen reluctantly working alongside Harold MacDougal. MacDougal regularly showers Nastas with patronizing ignorance of natural sciences and Native culture, while believing himself superior. During certain missions, Nastas expresses his fears for the loss of the forests, and the buffalo going extinct as well, regarding American "civilization" with resigned disdain. In his words "no one respects the land anymore". John identifies with this after a long journey during which he experienced encroaching federalism and technology for himself.

Because of their conflicting worldviews, Nastas gets into constant arguments with MacDougal. MacDougal dismisses traditional cultural knowledge, with which Nastas is adept; accurately commenting on the over-hunting of Buffalo. Contrary, MacDougal argues back invoking his poor understanding of natural selection and ethnocentric attitudes. John Marston appears to sympathize with Nastas, acknowledging his insight. Additionally, John appears to view Nastas with respect when he unconditionally accompanies him in an attempt to confront Dutch Van Der Linde.

Nastas is instantly killed after being shot in the head by a member of Dutch's Gang while being called a traitor, during a confrontation between MacDougal and the Native American members of the gang. An enraged Marston immediately shoots his murderers dead in revenge

MacDougal later shows his respect for Nastas by posting a paragraph in the Blackwater Ledger, noting his death writing "may you find god, dear friend."

Mission Appearances

 * Bear One Another's Burdens
 * At Home With Dutch
 * For Purely Scientific Purposes (killed)

Quotations
"I think they are intrested to find out what conclusions a white man has reached on hundreds of years of our culture and society from the comfort of his hotel room"

- Nastas replying to Harold MacDougal in "For Purely Scientific Purposes"

"For a wise man, you are a very stupid man, mister"

- Nastas to Harold MacDougal

Trivia

 * "Nastas" is a Navajo name which means "curve-like foxtail grass."
 * Nastas says he's trying to "rescue" the natives from their "destruction" this can be a reference to how low the native American population is today due to the devastating acts of American colonizers. It could also be a reference to the cultural "destruction" of Native Americans via assimilation programs and "Indian Schools" promoted by the U.S. government. See Dawes Act (1891) and Burke Act (1906).
 * Although Nastas is a Navajo name, it is more likely that he was modeled after a member of the Apache nation. He makes several coments about his tribe hunting buffalo, which were hunted by Apache and Comanche but not by the Navajo.