Poll: Time Lord daemons?

[tardis_stowaway]

I have a Doctor Who thought question for you! Over in Sherlock fandom I've read a number of excellent fics fusing the world of Sherlock with the His Dark Materials book trilogy, giving all the characters daemons*. I started wondering how such a fusion would work in the Doctor Who universe. Specifically, would Time Lord daemons be like human daemons? Please note that this is purely a speculative exercise; I have no plans for writing DW/HDM crossover fic (though I'd happily read any that's already out there...)[Poll #1752951]Feel free to use the comments to speculate further on this topic and/or suggest daemons for Doctor Who or Torchwood characters.

*A very quick primer for those who haven't read Phillip Pullman's excellent His Dark Materials Trilogy:  in this alternate universe fantasy, each person has a daemon, which is essentially an external manifestation of his/her soul.  Daemons take the shapes of animals.  During childhood they may shapeshift freely, then at adolescence they settle on a form that remains for the rest of the person's life.  Daemons have real physical form and may touch their own humans, inanimate objects, or other daemons, but touching another person's daemon is a deep cross-cultural taboo.

Comments

[kaydeefalls.livejournal.com]

I am torn between the daemon changing with each regeneration, or being the TARDIS. OR BOTH.

[tardis-stowaway.livejournal.com]

Both? Like the TARDIS redecorates the control room whenever the Time Lord regenerates? Interesting. :)

[kaydeefalls.livejournal.com]

Precisely. :)

[ladymercury-10.livejournal.com]

Pretty much any of those options would be cool.

[tardis-stowaway.livejournal.com]

Indeed! It's fun to think about.

[mysticalchild_isis]

I love the TARDIS as daemon option. Fascinating.

[tardis-stowaway.livejournal.com]

Thanks! For that option, I was thinking about the armored bears, whose armor is their soul. It's certainly interesting to speculate about.

[skalja.livejournal.com]

Apparently I'm in the minority, but I just can't get behind the idea of Time Lords having daemons. It makes them a little too human when HDM puts so much thematic emphasis on "has daemon = is human" and vice versa.

And the TARDISes are living beings in their own right (with their own personality and perspective, as we see several times in the Whoniverse), so making them part of their Time Lords feels really squicky to me. (Especially since the only TARDIS we really get to know is generally female-identified, and her pilot is consistently male-identified.)

That said, if they did have daemons I'm going with the "changes with every regeneration" option.

[tardis-stowaway.livejournal.com]

Hey, it's good to get a variety of opinions! Thanks for the comment.

It's been a while since I read the books, but I thought the witches are referred to as not human (though they do have children with humans), and witches certainly have daemons.

When I included the TARDIS-daemon option, I was thinking about armored bears, whose armor is their soul. Personally, I agree that TARDISes are too independent to be Time Lord daemons. However, arguing for that option, people and their daemons aren't always going to react identically to a given situation if they're in internal conflict about it. Since this is a hypothetical AU anyway, I think it's a reasonable stretch. Also, recall that in the HDM books, the large majority of people have a daemon of the opposite gender, so the fact that the Doctor is (so far) male and his TARDIS is female actually supports this scenario.

[skalja.livejournal.com]

I don't remember the witches being explicitly referred to (by people with accurate knowledge of their cultures an abilities) as non-human so much as not like the other humans ... and a big part of that, though certainly not all, is their ability to separate themselves physically from their daemons. By the end of the series they treat Lyra pretty much like a peer, because she too has learned how to move independently from Pan.

I know that daemons can have different reactions to events than their humans, and that they're usually the opposite gender -- my point is more that I find it generally kind of squicky to turn one character who is an independent being in their own right into a literal part of another character, and doubly so when it's a female character being subsumed into a male character. Particularly after The Doctor's Wife, which makes it so clear that the Doctor+TARDIS is a pairing of equals.

[tardis-stowaway.livejournal.com]

I thought I remembered witches referring to themselves as other than humans, but then I realized I was only certain of that memory from fanfic. Some quick googling did turn up some reference-type websites that specifically refer to witches as not human (

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I thought I remembered witches referring to themselves as other than humans, but then I realized I was only certain of that memory from fanfic. Some quick googling did turn up some reference-type websites that specifically refer to witches as not human (<a href="http://hdm.wikia.com/wiki/Witches"here they're called 'human-like creatures'</a>, and <a href="http://www.bridgetothestars.net/wiki/index.php?title=Witches">here it refers to witches living longer than humans</a>). However, it has been quite a few years since I read the books, so I can't verify that this isn't just a case of general cluelessness that includes me.

OK, I think I see what you're trying to say a bit better. As I now understand it, your point about the TARDIS we know being female is part of why it squicks you, not a reason the concept couldn't happen. Fair enough. If something were to happen within canon (or within a fic) that erased a character's individual personhood and made them part of another character, then I would totally share the squick. Something semi-analogous happened in the Dollhouse finale and it creeped me out in a major way, even with the genders reversed. It doesn't bother me personally to ask the question "but what would it be like if there was a world where she'd always been part of him and he was part of her?", but I see why it squicks you.

[kaffy_r]

Because I'm not certain every Time-Lord actually had his or her own TARDIS, I'm going to go with "changes w/regeneration." And, since I always read "daemon" as "soul," in my head, and I firmly believe Time-Lords have 'em, the human/non-human thing doesn't bother me.

[tardis-stowaway.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I'm pretty sure many Time Lords were homebodies and didn't have their own TARDISes. Certainly we see Romana travel with the Doctor inside his TARDIS. That option would require some further tweaking of canon beyond the obvious having of daemons.

And, since I always read "daemon" as "soul," in my head, and I firmly believe Time-Lords have 'em, the human/non-human thing doesn't bother me.

My thoughts exactly. Daemons aren't a biological adaptation that have been evolved by humans in Lyra's world but not on our Earth or Time Lords on Gallifrey. They're caused by different metaphysics in Lyra's universe that cause the soul to take daemon-form, and I think Doctor Who falls apart if you try to say the Doctor doesn't have a soul.

[tardis-stowaway.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I'm pretty sure many Time Lords were homebodies and didn't have their own TARDISes. Certainly we see Romana travel with the Doctor inside his TARDIS. That option would require some further tweaking of canon beyond the obvious having of daemons.

And, since I always read "daemon" as "soul," in my head, and I firmly believe Time-Lords have 'em, the human/non-human thing doesn't bother me.

My thoughts exactly. Daemons aren't a biological adaptation that have been evolved by humans in Lyra's world but not on our Earth or Time Lords on Gallifrey. They're caused by different metaphysics in Lyra's universe that cause the soul to take daemon-form, and I think Doctor Who falls apart if you try to say the Doctor doesn't have a soul.

[mad_maudlin]

Here from who_daily, and I just had to chime in because I wrote a DW daemon!fic and I decided that daemons are an Earth-specific trait, so humans and Silurians have them but Time Lords, space fish, etc. do not. Though I did throw in a TARDIS!daemon joke as well.

[tardis-stowaway.livejournal.com]

Hey, thanks for stopping by! Ooh, I'll have to check that fic out. How exciting!

[donutsweeper.livejournal.com]

oh INTERESTING. I've written a couple of different HDM crossovers/fusions so I've thought about this before.

If you go with the idea that most sentient creatures have daemons, than Time Lords certainly would have them as well. I like the idea that the daemon turns to Dust when the Time Lord dies and reforms when he regenerates.

[tardis-stowaway.livejournal.com]

The HDM trilogy already gives us a sentient creature that doesn't have daemons–the armored bears. Still, their armor is considered their soul, so they do follow the pattern of having some external soul. Still, my personal feeling is that a humanoid alien like a Time Lord would have a daemon.

Just wandered over to your journal and read your Torchwood/HDM fusions, which I enjoyed. Did you just make Jack's daemon a honey badger? That's fantastic.

[donutsweeper.livejournal.com]

Yes, the armored bears don't have daemons, but witches do and they were not quite human (although they could mate with humans)

(I'll admit I only read the first book though, so maybe I'm wrong on that)

Yep. Jack's daemon, Amichai, is a honey badger. Mostly because of this article: http://www.badassoftheweek.com/honeybadger.html and the fact it just *works*

I'd all the team's daemons planned out, just in case I wrote them, but so far only got to Jack, Susie, Gwen and Rhys.

[tardis-stowaway.livejournal.com]

Ha, excellent honey badger article. My favorite honey badger description is this youtube video, which is actually the same video clip in that article but with HILARIOUS new narration.

[donutsweeper.livejournal.com]

LOVE the new narration!

[10littlebullets.livejournal.com]

Completely off topic, but did anyone else get the impression that the handling of parallel worlds in s2 owed a lot to His Dark Materials? I thought it was kind of nifty.

[tardis-stowaway.livejournal.com]

In what sense? Lyra's world and Pete's world both had airships, but that's a common indicator of being in an alternate universe. It's been a while since I read the latter two HDM books, so I don't recall any ways that DW S2 is similar to them as opposed to any other sf/fantasy story with parallel worlds. I'm not contradicting, just looking for clarification. :)

edited to fix html fail

[kaesa.livejournal.com]

1. I understand why people would say "Time Lords aren't human, so their souls wouldn't necessarily take the form of daemons," but on Earth, the Doctor passes for (eccentric) human upon superficial inspection, and if everyone but him had a daemon, it'd be... different. Plus, daemons are fun.

2. Having decided Time Lords get daemons, I also figure a Time Lord's daemon would change with each regeneration and be able to change forms until the new Doctor was settled into his personality. (This doesn't really jive with HDM canon, but I don't really like the part of HDM canon about sex = personality permanence/adulthood, so I am happy to discard that.)

3. Would Time Lord daemons be limited to forms of Gallifreyan wildlife? What does Gallifreyan wildlife even look like?

[tardis-stowaway.livejournal.com]

Certainly he'd have a harder time passing among humans if they had daemons and he didn't. He'd have to devise some workaround like claiming his daemon was a small nocturnal animal concealed in his pocket that didn't like to come out when it was light. Then it would get dark and he'd need a new excuse. Yeah, it would be tricky.

I like the idea that the daemons changing form with regeneration might include a brief period of being able to shift at will while the Time Lord figures out who s/he has become. The Doctor often seems a little unsure of his personality after regeneration, and that wouldn't work if he could look over at what his daemon became and say "oh, I'm a ferret daemon sort of person now."

I was assuming that Time Lord daemons would originally have been Gallifreyan wildlife, but I wonder if they can now have off-world daemons. I would suspect a daemon could take any form the Time Lord (or future space-faring human?) knew about and identified with. As for Gallifrey wildlife, new Who doesn't tell us, and if classic Who gives any clues I don't know about it. Presumably the Time Lords evolved from some group of animals roughly analogous to mammals (vertebrates, four limbs, hair, possibly suckling their young as evidenced by Time Ladies having breasts), but what other wildlife might be present we don't know.

[kaesa.livejournal.com]

Aaand I just failed by jumping between any old Time Lord and the Doctor in my explanation. YOU KNOW WHAT I MEANT.

I feel like the strong visceral reaction to seeing someone without an immediately visible daemon in HDM would make it difficult to explain to passers-by, "No, don't worry, I have a bat daemon. She's allergic to ...quarries. Yes, that's it!" But the Doctor could come up with something, surely. I stand by my assertion that daemons are fun.

I think in Invasion of Time the Gallifreyans living outside the Citadel are shown wearing furs, which presumably they hunted themselves, so they at least have large furry animals. ...Or possibly large furry vegetation.

[tardis-stowaway.livejournal.com]

If the Doctor was trying to pass as human without a daemon, I suspect many people would generate their own explanations for why there wasn't a daemon immediately visible. The expectation that people have daemons is so strong I think they'd be unwilling to believe the lack of daemon before their eyes, since the Doctor is clearly not damaged like people who have undergone intercision and he's too male to be a witch.

Gallifreyans living outside the Citadel are shown wearing furs, which presumably they hunted themselves, so they at least have large furry animals. ...Or possibly large furry vegetation.

LOL! Way to think outside the box. I also support your assertion that daemons are fun.

[thinkatory.livejournal.com]

I am imagining the Doctor finding a white mouse or something somewhere (probably his pockets; I swear Four had white mice in his pockets once) and being all ".... YEP, THIS IS MY DAEMON. SHE DOESN'T TALK." Or, potentially, ventriloquism.

[kaesa.livejournal.com]

LOL. And now I'm picturing the mouse having passed its expiration date, aaaand cue Dead Parrot Skit.

Ooh, or he could carry a hamster that's been chewing slightly psychic paper, so that people would hear it saying whatever they expected his daemon to say.

[katflace.livejournal.com]

I got here through who_daily and am probably doing to ramble for a bit, so sorry in advance for that! :)

My thought is really that they would not have daemons at all, not even invisible ones like the humans of Will's world. I really did read the books as saying daemons were totally unique to human beings and that every other species of sapient beings had its own way of connecting to Dust - the Panserbjorne don't have daemons, the Gallivespians don't, the Mulefa don't. Time Lords may look human, but they're still different from us, and I don't like skimming over the difference like that.

(Of course I also don't think daemons really were peoples' souls, but that that was just the explanation the humans of Lyra's world had come up with for their existance due to not knowing what was really going on...)

If they did have daemons, I think there's a good chance they'd settle as animals we wouldn't recognise at all. Though that poses the question of what even limits the forms someone's daemon can take - can they take a form the person has never even seen? It seems a bit weird, can you imagine some poor medieval villager's daemon becoming a platypus and their peers' reactions to it? If it's only limited by known animals, than presumably the Doctor's daemon at least could take the form of an Earth animal, but would not necessarily, if there was something that fit even better out there. I also do think that yes, it'd change with regeneration (or else it wouldn't even be an issue, they'd settle before they ever left Gallifrey, end up with a Gallifreyan form and that would be that). They'd probably be unsettled for a bit while the new incarnation was stabilising - so Ten's daemon would not have a fixed form during The Christmas Invasion, for instance - before taking a new permanent form.

Finally, I actually have written a ficlet (http://katflace.livejournal.com/556693.html) that plays with this a bit, if you're interested. Probably the reason I've thought about this so much, heh. I've wanted to write more bits from the same world - for instance, surely Three would've needed some way of creating the illusion of having a daemon, if he was going to interact who didn't know he wasn't human during his exile? - but I've never gotten around to it so far...