Meet the Stars: Esmeralda

Widely regarded to be the most beautiful flea ever to have hopped on the flat earth(1) of the grid, Esmeradla Consuela Conchita Adriana Alondra Jones(2) has always had an uncanny ability to turn heads and bring calm to where there is discord. Born in Svarga, she was raised, as were all the flea clans of that part of the world, on the blood of the much feared Sarcastic Sloth of Svarga, a beast known throughout the grid for reducing even the most hardened of travellers to tears with its sharp tongue and keenly observed cutting remarks. Over the years, a constant diet of this blood had a terrible effect on the once relaxed and friendly fleas and they became a mean bunch of malcontents given to liking bare-knuckle boxing and pig-sticking. And so it would have been for poor Esmeralda had it not been for her mother.

Her mother(3) was, unbeknownst to her clan, a vegetarian and sucked only on the pure, sweet nectar of Svarga’s many floral delights. She raised Esmeralda to do the same and in doing so, raised the sweetest creature the grid has ever known(4).

Although shunned by the other fleas as being a “flower hugging liberal commie” the young Esmeralda consoled herself in dance, a medium she used to express her joy and happiness. She practiced her beautiful dances alone in the forests and bluebell glades of the islands – or she thought she was alone! The frogs came at first, a few hopping by saw her and spread the word. The rabbits came next. And the bees. Then the crocodiles. And even the hippos. All came to watch this enchanting flea pirouette and sashay between the wild orchids. Until eventually the sloths came.

They came en masse with the dark intentions of pouring so much sarcastic bile on the proceedings that as one the audience would hop off the nearest cliff in a mass act of desperation. But as soon as they clapped their peepers on the be-tutued flea, their hearts melted and their taunts stuck in their throats. Esmeralda had calmed the wild beasts of Svaraga once and for all and whenever she danced, travellers were safe from having their choice of clothing mocked and their sexual preferences called into question.

It was in the rescuing of just such a traveller that she came to the attention of Professor Antfarmoffski and the rest, dear reader is history…

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(1) Until anyone proves me wrong, this world is flat and that is all there is to it.

(2) Her father was Welsh. From Blaenau Ffestiniog. Lived on a slate miner.

(3) Spanish. From Minaro. Lovely lass.

(4) With the possible exception of Violet Faulds, of course!