History Main / YourDaysAreNumbered

* In ''Fanfic/ChildOfTheStorm'', Doctor Strange, who has been TheAgeless since long before he became the Sorcerer Supreme in 1645, reveals this a little over halfway through the first book, and reiterates it in the sequel. Being both a time traveller and a very powerful {{Seer}}, he knows exactly when he's going to die, and is making preparations for his death. Among them, [[spoiler: bequeathing the position of Sorcerer Supreme on his former apprentice, Wanda Maximoff]].

* In ''Anime/JujutsuKaisen'' this concept is actually worked ''TOWARDS'' by Yuji Itadori to reduce that number as much as possible. Although, nobody knows how long it will take, Once he consumes all 20 of Sukuna's fingers he's scheduled to be executed so the demon can be properly exorcised and wipe out their curse before it can exert itself on the world. Yuji has accepted this as his duty and the way he chooses to die.

See also SecretlyDying, LikeYouWereDying, SomeoneHasToDie, TheLastDance, LastDayToLive, IWillOnlySlowYouDown, AlmostDeadGuy, LivingOnBorrowedTime, YouAreAlreadyDead, and WhodunnitToMe

* ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'' player characters turned into Revenants have this stipulation attached -- once you complete a set goal, the character dies and for the most part [[FinalDeath cannot be revived]].

* A non-fatal example in ''WebComic/SleeplessDomain'': regardless of when a magical girl's powers awaken, they usually lose their powers in their late teens, so many try to make the most of it before then. [[spoiler: There's two known cases when someone lost their powers prematurely: Tessa burns out her power to heal Undine and loses her powers (which she isn't adjusting to well at all), and Kokoro's mother Mitsuki lost her powers when they somehow transferred to Kokoro while she was in the womb.]]

* In the ''Series/{{NCIS}}'' episode "[[WhodunnitToMe Dead Man Walking]]," Ziva becomes very close to Lt. Roy Sanders while he is dying of radiation poisoning, causing her and Jenny considerable distress.

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* This is part of the plot of ''Young Liars''. In the first chapter, the reader learns that [[spoiler:Sadie]], one of the main characters, survives a gunshot wound to the head, but is told by the doctor that sooner or later, she will die due to the bullet slowly migrating through the skull.
* In ''ComicBook/TheAdventuresOfBarryWeenBoyGenius'', the titular character estimates that at the rate his SuperIntelligence is increasing [[BlessedWithSuck he'll be driven mad by the time he's 21]].

* Once perpetrated on ''ComicBook/XMan'' - essentially, there was something in his genes that would lead to his death in the near-future. Creator/WarrenEllis, who wrote subsequent issues of the comic, referred to it as the "Dead At 21 TV Plot Engine" and advocated getting rid of it as fast as possible.

* The BlackComedy ''The End'' features Burt Reynolds as a man who begins a series of [[SuicideAsComedy hilariously unsuccessful suicide attempts]] after discovering he's got a terminal disease.

* ''Film/DragMeToHell'' - Allison is gypsy-cursed to have her soul dragged to hell in three days.

* ''Film/NightOfTheDemon'' - Cult leader Julian Carswell informs Dr. Holden (who is seeking to publicly debunk him) his death will fall on a specific date, thanks to a curse he's cast.

* ''Film/InTime'' mainly based on this. To put bluntly, everyone is allowed to live until 25 without an issue, but they are only given a year before they die instantly upon the time on their forearm is up. They can add more time in order to live, but there is a cost for living and mind you... time is the currency.

* ''Series/OnceUponATime'' features the Evil Queen [[WeddingSmashers crashing Snow White and Prince Charming's wedding]] to announce that she was going to cast a curse that would take away everything they loved and send them all someplace horrible. The time frame between her making this threat and actually completing the curse is several months--at least nine, as Snow conceived and gave birth to Emma in time to send her out of reach of the curse before it hit.

* ''Series/TwentyFour'':
** Early in the second season, George Mason is exposed to a lethal dose of radiation and is told he has a day or so to live. Twelve episodes/hours later, he takes Jack's place in making a HeroicSacrifice.
** The plot gets reused in season seven when Jack is infected by the terrorists' weapon and will die within hours, which means he has to bring the villains to justice from the sidelines (his weakened health could make him a liability on the field) and also try to make peace with himself in the remaining time he has left. [[spoiler:He's the main character, so he gets a last minute save by a miracle cure at the end of the season.]]

* ''Theatre/{{Rent}}'''s "One Song Glory" is one of the most heartbreaking portrayals of this.

* A 2010 Berlin performance of Creator/BertoltBrecht's ''Theatre/TheRiseAndFallOfTheCityOfMahagonny'' toys with this. In the original play, two characters die from sheer decadence: one by overeating and one by losing a boxing match. In the 2010 performance, the stage directions were projected onto a screen and often ignored or even protested by the characters, following Brecht's philosophy of "Verfremdung". So when Jacob sees that the stage directions say he has to die, he first starts protesting, then laughing, then whimpering, then falls over helplessly and ''stays there for the rest of the act while other characters are swimming in money around his corpse''. He's joined by the boxer character (Joe) soon after. The performance is... unsettling.

* After ''[[VideoGame/GuiltyGear Guilty Gear X]]'', Millia kills Zato-1, but this allows Eddie, the parasite that gave Zato-1 his powers, to fully control his body. However, as Zato's body is dead, it's decaying - and when it becomes unusable, Eddie will die. Thus he spends subsequent games hunting for a new host. Zato-1 is resurrected in ''Xrd'', which saves Eddie... but pisses him off, because that means he's stuck being a tool again.

* ''VideoGame/BaldursGateIII'' starts off with your character (and your companions) getting implanted with illithid tadpoles, which will, unless you can get it out before then (something liable to require fairly powerful magic), transform you into an illithid within a few days, effectively killing you. [[spoiler: It turns out that ''something'' is keeping the transformation at bay, but since none of you have the faintest idea of what that might be, you still have to live under the fear that at any time it could fail and allow the transformation to occur.]]

* Near the beginning of ''VisualNovel/DiesIraeInterviewWithKazikluBey'' it is revealed that Claudia has at most one month left to live and is dying from skin cancer. She treats it as a non issue and just goes about her life as usual best she can. Wilhelm on the other hand decides to try and make the best use of that time in order to make her soul as radiant as he can so that he can kill her during that peak and claim it for his own. [[spoiler:Things end up not working out for him as Caudia ends up having to perform a HeroicSacrifice to save him from her own out of control Creation Figment]].

* In ''Webcomic/SandraAndWoo'', we've known for years Larissa has A) psychological issues for which she takes medication, B) diabetes. In [[http://www.sandraandwoo.com/2015/09/14/0718-corrupting-the-youth/ strip #718]], we learn she has an underlying condition that caused both: [[spoiler:[[http://ghr.nlm.nih.gov/condition/wolfram-syndrome Wolfram Syndrome]] - a disease for which the oldest known sufferer lived to 49 and the median lifespan is 28]].

* On an episode of ''WesternAnimation/TheJetsons'', George goes for his physical and, afterwards, the doctor tells him he's probably going to die soon and says if he has anything he's ever wanted to do, do it now. George takes advantage of this to finally tell off Mr. Spacely. Spacely is impressed enough by this display of fearlessness that he offers George the opportunity to be the test pilot for the indestructible jacket his company has designed. Just before the last test (where two missiles will be fired at him), the doctor tells him there was a mistake and he'll probably live to be 150.

* Dean on ''Series/{{Supernatural}}'' [[spoiler:sold his soul to a demon in exchange for Sam returning to life and was given only one year until the contract came up and he died]]. This is a standard clause in every DealWithTheDevil. The human has only ten years to live after making the deal. Despite this and the usual price of torture in hell, there are still plenty of people making such deals.

** Also in OG, as per her origin, Ariel Org of ''Real Robot Regiment'' only has moments to live as a result of being a product of the Idealant Project. Like Glacies/Ventus, in the original game, she decided to live the rest of her life by making the best out of it, and in ''OG'' [[spoiler:fellow ArtificialHuman [[VideoGame/SuperRobotWarsAdvance Lamia Loveless]] is helping to find a way to remove that problem by reverse-engineering herself.]] Also, this trope is the reason why Ariel's 'rival/brother' Duvan Org becomes very power hungry and instead [[AGodAmI tried to achieve godlike power]].

See also SecretlyDying, LikeYouWereDying, SomeoneHasToDie, TheLastDance, LastDayToLive, IWillOnlySlowYouDown, AlmostDeadGuy, LivingOnBorrowedTime, WhodunnitToMe, and YouAreAlreadyDead

See also SecretlyDying, LikeYouWereDying, SomeoneHasToDie, TheLastDance, LastDayToLive, IWillOnlySlowYouDown, AlmostDeadGuy, LivingOnBorrowedTime, and WhodunnitToMe

* This is played with Webcomic/KillLaKillAU, ''Room 002108'', we had this initially with Ryuuko, when she was ill with an unknown illness the which she was hospitalized for tests. According to Rei and from what the readers could observe, if she wasn't taken to be treated abroad, then she wouldn't have lived past her ninth birthday, especially when the illness turned [[spoiler:septicemic]] and would have caused her organs to fail.

* The end of ''Fanfic/TheOutside'' has the doctor explaining to Ryuuko and Ragyo that, while they don't know how long exactly Satsuki will live after that event, they do know her life expectancy is shorter than the former's, effectively saying this trope.

* In ''FanFic/PurpleDays'', Joffrey raids Grand Maester Pycelle's records, in which he finds evidence of a long poisoning campaign he's been submitting Robert to on Tywin's orders. A mournful Joffrey realizes either Pycelle made a mistake or the poisoning was more effective than expected, and in either case, the man holding the Seven Kingdoms in line is doomed by the start of the GroundhogDayLoop.

* In the [[TearJerker infamously sad]] ''Fanfic/RequiemForALoud'', Lincoln Loud is diagnosed with a terminal illness that will kill him in 2 to 3 weeks.

* In the fantasy movie ''Film/{{Krull}}'', the cyclopes were beings with two eyes, but they bartered away their second eye to The Beast in order to see the future. The Beast instead tricked them, and the only future they can see is the time of their own death.

* This trope is the premise (and sometimes the whole plot) of many romance movies - examples include ''Autumn in New York'', ''Sweet November'', etc... and the eponymous ''Love Story''.

* [[Film/JamesBond Bond villain]] Renard from ''Film/TheWorldIsNotEnough'' is a terrorist who [[spoiler:is hopelessly in love with Elektra King]] and he's got a bullet lodged in his brain that's migrating, preventing him from feeling pain, but it's only a matter of time before it kills him.

* The plot of ''Literature/CharlottesWeb'' involves a spring pig learning he's going to slaughtered for Christmas dinner and it's up to a spider to praise him with her web so he can live his life.

*** Albert (Death's manservant), when he realized he was going to die soon, performed the [[SummoningRitual Rite of AshkEnte]], which summons Death, in reverse, hoping to keep Death away, but instead transporting him to Death's domain (which may have been his actual intention). He's effectively immortal there, but if he ever returns to the world, the time he has left (about three months) will start passing again. [[spoiler:After the events of ''Literature/SoulMusic'', his lifetimer is smashed and Death manages to save a few seconds of time in a beer bottle: if Albert ever returns to the Disc again, he'll die immediately. Though the normal rules of time are suspended during Hogswatch Night, so the Hogfather can make all his deliveries in one night, which allows Albert to tag along with Death when he's [[SubbingForSanta Subbing For The Hogfather]].]]

*** Albert (Death's manservant), when he realized he was going to die soon, performed the [[SummoningRitual Rite of AshkEnte]], which summons Death, in reverse, hoping to keep Death away, but instead transporting him to Death's domain (which may have been his actual intention). He's effectively immortal there, but if he ever returns to the world, the time he has left (about three months) will start passing again. [[spoiler:After the events of ''Literature/SoulMusic'', his lifetimer is smashed and Death manages to save a few seconds of time in a beer bottle: if Albert ever returns to the Disc again, he'll die immediately. Though the normal rules of time are suspended during Hogswatch Night, so the Hogfather can make all his deliveries in one night, which allows Albert to tag along with Death when he's [[SubbingForSanta Subbing For The Hogfather]].]]

* [[spoiler:Belkar Bitterleaf]] in ''The [[Webcomic/TheOrderOfTheStick Order of the Stick]]''. The Oracle mentions that he "should savour his next birthday cake", along with several other less than subtle hints, surprisingly early on, but everyone forgets it due to the spell ensuring they only remember the predictions they paid for. The Oracle later gives [[spoiler:Roy's ghost]] an official prediction (carefully worded to avoid ProphecyTwist, not that this stops fans who don't want to accept [[spoiler:the Belkster's]] impending demise from trying) that he will "take his last breath - ever - before the end of the year", of which there are less than seven weeks left. There's no way of knowing how many strips that means, however.

*** Albert (Death's manservant), when he realized he was going to die soon, performed the [[SummoningRitual Rite of AshkEnte]], which summons Death, in reverse, hoping to keep Death away, but instead transporting him to Death's domain (which may have been his actual intention). He's effectively immortal there, but if he ever returns to the world, the time he has left (about three months) will start passing again. [[spoiler:After the events of ''Literature/SoulMusic'', his lifetimer is smashed and Death manages to save a few seconds of time in a beer bottle: if Albert ever returns to the Disc again, he'll die immediately. Though the normal rules of time are suspended during Hogswatch Night, so the Hogfather can make all his deliveries in one night, which allows Albert to tag along with Death when he's [[SubbingForSanta Subbing For The Hogfather]].]]

-->'''Khrima:''' More like...numbered to infinity! For my number will continue to increment! The only number of consequence is your chance of beating me! And that's ZERO!

*** Albert (Death's manservant), when he realized he was going to die soon, performed the [[SummoningRitual Rite of AshkEnte]], which summons Death, in reverse, hoping to keep Death away, but instead transporting him to Death's domain (which may have been his actual intention). He's effectively immortal there, but if he ever returns to the world, the time he has left (about three months) will start passing again. [[spoiler:After the events of ''Literature/SoulMusic'', his lifetimer is smashed and Death manages to save a few seconds of time in a beer bottle: if Albert ever returns to the Disc again, he'll die immediately. Though the normal rules of time are suspended during Hogswatch Night, so the Hogfather can make all his deliveries in one night, which allows Albert to tag along with Death when he's [[SubbingForSanta Subbing For The Hogfather]].]]