Soap Bubbles

The Soap Bubbles (usually called Bubbles) were a party founded in the year 3842 in the Thunder Empire as the Thunder Empire was being conquered by Dreamland. The Thunderers here had decided to collaborate with the Dreamers, as although they preferred independence, they felt that the Dreamers at least were rescuing the Thunderers from their previous oppressor, the Crystals. The Bubbles were the ones who refused to collaborate. Although both the Bubbles and the submissivist Thunderers agreed that they preferred independence, the Bubbles differed in that if their destiny was to be oppressed, they preferred Crystal oppressors to Dreamer oppressors.

Early history

The Soap Bubbles were not related to the Soap Bubble Societies of the 2400s despite originating in nearly the same geographic area. Since that earlier name was still in use amongst the descendants of those nations, as two of the three nations had in fact survived, they occasionally referred to themselves, at least in that part of the world, as the Snow. Snow had actually been the original proposed name for their party, but it had been changed to Soap before the official founding date in 3842, as they wanted a name that would be less inviting to the Dreamers and Dreamerized Thunderers who seemed to feel that the whole world was their bathroom.

The Soap Bubbles sometimes used nonviolent imagery to appeal to their enemies; whereas all of the other armies would slice people up with swords and stab them with spears, being conquered by the Soap Bubble army would merely make people feel refreshed and a ltitle bit prettier. They painted murals of their people dressed as soldiers, with giant white soap bars in place of swords. However, they knew from history that such claims to innocence bought little sympathy from stronger armies, and that if they ever wanted to be anything more than the bottommost group amongst an already oppressed people they would need to behave like normal people and establish a conventional army with swords and shields.

When the Thunderers overthrew the Dreamers in 3884 and established a racist government that oppressed Crystals moderately and Dreamers severely, the Bubbles did not reconcile. Even though the Bubbles had agreed all along that the Dreamers were far worse than the Crystals, the Thunderers had drifted so far apart from Bubblism by this time that the two parties had become enemies. The Bubbles claimed that they were the true descendants of the original Thunder party, because while the Thunderers had changed greatly under the Dreamer government, the Bubbles, having not been corrupted by power, had not changed at all. The Bubbles were very weak during this government, and many moved into Crystal territory to live amongst their oppressors, or into nations such as Paba where the central government was too weak to do them any harm.

When in 3919 the racist Thunder government was overthrown by a more moderate Thunder government, the Bubbles still did not make peace with the Thunderers. Nevertheless, the Thunder Empire was a very large place, and the Bubbles were able to find places to live within it in which they could live amongst only their own kind, protected by small but powerful Soap Bubble militias. They also set up colonies within Crystal territory, although these were much weaker, as the Crystals had better control of their territory and were racially distinct from the vast majority of the Bubbles and could thus spot them on sight.

Later history

The Bubbles nevertheless became known as the least violent of the many mutually hostile armies during the chaotic period between the last days of the Thunder Empire (4108) and the beginning of the Swampy Empire (4149). Indeed, they had remained completely nonparticipant in any violence, although because they were so small and weak, they at times entered into alliances with the Crystals in which the Crystals promised to protect them.