Leo's first contribution was tech support. "If this Alcantara guy is shady, we need to be smart," he said, hunched over his laptop in his bedroom later that day. "Old-school rich families like that have skeletons. Digital ones."
He started digging. His fingers flew across the keyboard, pulling up property records, old digital newspaper archives I didn't know existed, and social media profiles of the Alcantara family.
Luna watched from a corner of the room, her form slightly translucent in the afternoon light. Leo couldn't see her, but he'd look at the spot I indicated, a thrill of nervous excitement on his face.
"Okay, this is weird," Leo muttered, scrolling through a microfiche scan of a 1997 business section. "Hector's dad, Don Ricardo Alcantara, was pushing for a huge land development deal back then. A resort on the coastal strip near Batung-Bato Cove."
I remembered the article Luna and I found. "Local Fisherman Reports Strange Lights Near Batung-Bato Cove."
"The deal was controversial," Leo continued. "Environmentalists and local fishermen were protesting. It was all over the news." He scrolled to a later article from early 1998. "And then… it just… quietly went through. The opposition just… vanished."
He looked up at me, his expression grim. "The article says the main spokesperson for the fishermen, a guy named Miguel Reyes, suddenly withdrew his opposition for 'personal reasons.'" The name hung in the air. Reyes.
Luna, who had been listening intently, let out a soft, haunted sound. "Papa," she whispered.
The puzzle pieces were clicking into place, and the picture they formed was dark and dangerous. Luna's father was the opposition. Luna vanished. The opposition vanished with her.