Maya's POV
I woke in Katarina's safe house three days after my administrative death to find news coverage of my funeral playing on muted television. Mom stood at podium delivering eulogy with grief that looked devastatingly real despite knowing it was performance constructed around uncomfortable truth.
"My daughter believed truth mattered more than safety," Mom said to cameras broadcasting internationally. "She pursued justice knowing the cost might be her life. That cost was extracted by criminals who preferred darkness to accountability. Maya's death is not tragedy—it is murder. And those responsible will face consequences even if legal systems have failed thus far."
I watched myself being eulogized, my corpse—the homeless woman who had become my physical substitute—being lowered into
