Title: Souls Without
Author: Darkling59
Published: 10/19/2012
Disclaimer: Bleach and His Dark Materials (and all associated characters, settings, concepts, etc) do not belong to me. All names and their meanings are taken from either babynames . com or '20,000 Names from Around the World'.
Summary: Dæmon!fic. HDM fusion. Drabbles on the Bleach characters and their animal companions/soul manifestations. When your soul walks by your side, it becomes much harder to hide who you really are from your friends, your foes …and yourself.

On the subject of dæmons:

Dæmons are the physical manifestation of a human's emotional 'heart', and are thought to be the seat of their sense of empathy and spiritual power. As a living, growing child, this sense is still mutable and the dæmon shifts in response to mood and whim. However, during puberty, beliefs and personality become more concrete, and the dæmon 'settles' on a particular form that reflects the inner soul of the human. This generally occurs between the ages of 12 and 16, though exceptions as young as 7 and as old as 23 have been observed. It should be noted that exceptions generally occur in response to extreme emotional trauma or mental illness. It should also be noted that, while most dæmons cannot move more than three meters from their human, certain sects undergo rituals capable of extending that range.

While a human is alive, their dæmon takes on the form of an animal that they have a 'deeper' connection to. It is often difficult to understand the subtle nuances of why a dæmon chooses a particular form, and little stock should be placed in social stereotypes (ie. dogs belong in law enforcement, snakes are unreliable, ferrets are criminals, mice are cowards, etc.). As the second half of a soul, the dæmon is as intelligent as its human and can speak any language that its other half can. Typically, a dæmon is the opposite gender of its human, although exceptions have been observed.

Upon death, a dæmon appears, to human eyes, to dissolve. In reality, it transforms into a plus's chain of fate. A plus will instinctively want to move on to Soul Society in order to regain the part of its soul that it can no longer communicate with. Once in Soul Society, the dæmon will appear in the shape of the form it held in life but will be opaque or 'misty' and its voice will only be audible to its own human. More spiritual energy will give the dæmon more substance, and reiatsu-potential can often be discerned by how solid a dæmon appears and how many people can hear its voice. The dæmons of shinigami are often virtually identical to those of living humans.

If a soul is not sent to Soul Society before encroachment fully consumed the chain of fate, the dæmon will be lost for good and the plus will transform into a hollow, devoid of emotions, empathy, and any connection to humanity. Hollows will forever feel a longing to fill the void left by their dæmon, although they rarely if ever remember its existence, and will devour pluses in an attempt to alleviate that hunger and fill the emptiness within.

-Excerpt from 'The Origin of Hollows and Shinigami'
(First year study material at the Spiritual Arts Academy)

Author's Notes:

- I have noticed a considerable lack of dæmon!fics in the Bleach fandom so I decided to take a crack at it and add at least one, even if it isn't very good. (If you know of any that already exist, please let me know! I'd love to read them.)

-Three chapters (the Introduction, Tousen, and Gin) are paraphrased from chapter 17 of my fic 'Howling at the Moon' in which I explore Stark and Lilynette's soul connection in an HDM fusion 'verse.

-As a fusion rather than a true crossover, I was unsure which category to put this under. I decided on Bleach because the only thing it has to do with HDM is the concept of dæmons; no actual 'crossing over' takes place.

- This fic was inspired by the many amazing dæmon!fics/HDM fusions out there in fandoms across the board: Supernatural, Sherlock, Stargate Atlantis, Stargate SG1, Glee, Doctor Who, Final Fantasy 7, Harry Potter, Merlin, Avengers, Star Wars, The Walking Dead, Naruto…the list goes on ad infinitum

Three specific HDM fusion fics I can point to as inspiration are:
1. The Republic of Heaven (Sherlock) by Blind_Author (on ao3)
2. The Soul You Can See (Supernatural) by alicat54 (on ffnet)
3. A Study in Natural Philosophy (Merlin) by Mad_Maudlin (on ao3)

Two awesome HDM fusion fics I found while hunting down my inspiration are:
1. Fallen Empires (The Walking Dead) by zhina (on ao3)
2. Inner Vision (Naruto) by AvocadoLove (on ao3 and ffnet)

Please Read and Review!