The BOOTLEG KINDERGARTEN

As a follow-up to that trade-names post, I want a story about a community of rejected gem models all based on those ‘Not Really A Thing’ made-up trade name gems.

But not like “Mountain Jade isn’t really jade, that’s not a thing, it’s just Serpentine given an artsy-sounding name,” though, because serpentine is, itself, a thing. I mean like ““Motor Agate” is literally just paint, it’s not a mineral, that’s not a thing.”

I want this whole subculture of off-the-grid not-a-thing bootleg gems, sea opal and goldstone and fakey bullshit ‘rainbow moonstones’ that are just opalized glass. Baroque Pearls are Not Invited because they are still technically Real Gems by this metric in particular. The bar is low and they hate everybody.

Thematically, they get the whole family of ‘what is Person when you are off and below the entire goddamn scale, what does that mean when the low-down bugs-on-the-heels-of-the-world bottom of the lowest rung don't even think you're worth that much’ tropes that android fiction writers like so much.

Only problem is that they don't give a shit. They’re a band of dirty, rowdy punks, all blood in their hair and paint on their teeth and they are not here for introspective existential goddamn horseshit, they’re just here to get fucked up. You made a race of lab-grown dancing dolls and utterly failed to give them any capacity to give a shit about anything, at least not in any way convenient for you, nice work. They’re not about smashing the system. They're not about stepping up. They, fundamentally, do not care whether they count as Real People to anyone outside of themselves. They don’t want to Make A Point, they’re here to Make A Scene.