As long as no one is mentioning anything that sounds relevant to her she keeps napping.

Her name comes up several times, actually. And the word "amalien" and remarks that she is missing.

She wakes up when people mention her name and pays attention to what they're saying about her.

"By all accounts this was obviously the amalien's own idea and she seems to think you're cute, we're not going to crack down any harder than we need to to find her," says a voice. "But we think she may be here - maybe she snuck in, maybe she threatened you, maybe her pet mouse has hypnosis powers, frankly I don't care - and we want you all out of the way till we've searched the place, top to bottom. You can go to work and park at the landfill or the incinerator or the sewage station till you get the all-clear, the social workers in Nauan and Pioppi are having their reds send extra vehicles to collect you and you can go there instead, we're diverting deliveries to those places. Got it? Because I don't want to say that a hundred more times and I don't want any of you to be here when they bring in the dogs."

OH NO! 

That doesn't sound like things you say to people who want to help you that sounds like the red haired people aren't getting a choice and it's her fault and and and.

She only panics for a bit before her mind starts working on problem solving. 

The dogs are going to be really good at smelling and maybe also hearing and can find her and hiding from smell is much much harder and... Actually she has everything she needs to solve this here.

Step one is to exercise, quietly.

Step two is to rub Cheep on her armpits. Sorry Cheep. 

Next she looks intently at Cheep.

"I need you to go away and wait for me. Tish and Haemi's house would be okay. But. Shoo. Sorry Cheep."

"Cheep."

Cheep can tell he is supposed to go away and not be here and he trusts his Meelia to find him later. He leaves, heading back to the house where he snuggled with her in that comfy place a while ago.

Now, this is the second worst part, she needs to stop smelling like herself. 

She takes the bleach she'd saved for future hair dying and pours it all over her belongings and then herself.

ow ow ow o- 

She briefly loses consciousness. When she wakes up she has to do the last bit of plan so she doesn't sweat or make noise or anything for a bit.

She lies on her back and positions her wooden sword in just the right place and makes sure the tip is sharp enough, before plunging it into her heart, pouring the last of the bleach on top as she does so.

Amaliens are hard to kill and Meelia was careful not to do more than a minimal amount of damage, but it will still take a few weeks for her heart to start beating again after a wound like that. In the meantime, she naps. As silent as the grave.

They find Cheep, eventually, and put him in a cage in a government office in case.

They don't find Meelia.

Meelia stretches and starts to yawn, before remembering she's hiding and clamping her hand over her mouth. 

She wasn't found! Now to go out and befriend some reds. Well, first she should touch up her disguise. Her hair hasn't grown much at all but she carefully applies some dye to the roots anyways. Next, she scratches up her face some so it's sorta swollen in places and generally she looks a bit different, in case anyone has seen her before. Brushing her bangs into her eyes to add more disguisedness, she sneaks out of the house, onto the street. She's not really trying to stay hidden anymore, though she's hiding that she's scared and nervous. She doesn't know if this is gonna work.

There's...

nobody here, actually, the place is deserted.

... Did they not let the people back?????? She hadn't even considered that a poss-ibility! A single tear runs down her face as she starts searching for clues.

They seem to have taken some time about leaving - the lights are off and there aren't half-finished meals on the tables. The stores have been mostly emptied and there are a few objects that may have been dropped on the way out and not deemed worth going back for. The vehicles are all gone.

She... doesn't know what to do this time.

She lets herself cry for a while. It's important to do that sometimes.

There are traffic sounds from the surrounding neighborhoods, so it's not like they've evacuated the whole city.

That's not actually reassuring!

Meelia eventually pulls herself together enough to think through what she should do next. She thinks over what she knows about the red haired people and other amentans and everything. 

She considers trying to get back to the rest of the amaliens, possibly by surrendering herself. They'd help - she knows that - but she doesn't actually have an obvious thing for them to do yet and she's worried the amnetnas will stop her from telling them and and....

She really really doesn't want to give up. But does she have any other options? 

She could try to find the red haired people. She has no idea where they are and more importantly she'd definitely get caught if she searched. Her disguise is not that perfect and they'd be surprised to see a person with red hair not wherever they took the red haired people. Hm, there might be a way she could get them to put her with the red haired people by appearing red haired? But but... they'd check to see if she was her first. Can she get around that? 

She thinks back to everything else she knows about the Amentans, and the red haired people....

Oh. That plan is even worse than the last one.

A while later, a fire starts in the former red district.

The firefighters show up after someone notices the smoke. They drive in and spray it with a lot of water and leave.