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{{trope}}
[[File:
Characters who are technically "already dead" but, by one way or another, are able to put it off. Maybe they [[Cyborg|grafted machine parts onto themselves]] to support their new way of life. Maybe they just have to avert their death constantly because [[You Can't Fight Fate]].
The long-term version of [[The Last Dance]]. If they're so heavily consumed by their Life Support that they're practically alive [[In Name Only]], it's [[And I Must Scream]]. If they apply it ''after'' they die, they're [[The Undead]] ([[Our Zombies Are Different|Revenant]]).
{{deathtrope}}
{{examples}}
== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==
* {{spoiler|Yuko Ichihara}} of ''[[
* The entirety of ''[[Cowboy Bebop]]'' is part of what [[The Hero|Spike]] considers borrowed time: Due to an undisclosed event in his back-story he believes he's already dead and only living out a [[Dying Dream]] he has yet to wake from.
* {{spoiler|Zest}} in ''[[Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha StrikerS|Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha Striker S]]'' is revealed to be a former TSAB agent resurrected by Scaglietti with his cyborg project. Even after resurrection, his body is constantly degenerating, and he believes that he's running on borrowed time in order to finish some business with the TSAB.
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* The origin of [[Iron Man]]. He has a nuclear reactor his chest that powers a magnet that keeps shrapnel from entering his heart and killing him. In Real Life, he'd be dead.
== Fan Works ==
* [[Alternate Universe Fic|AU]] [[Real Person Fic]], ''[https://archiveofourown.org/works/21005483 After Case Report]'', the narrator explains how that {{spoiler|[[Spice Girls| Melanie C]]}} was facing this in the events in ''[https://archiveofourown.org/works/20994356 Case of the Missing Technology]'' as while she was being subjected to [[Unwilling Roboticisation]].
* [[Alternate Universe Fic|AU]] [[Real Person Fic]], ''[https://archiveofourown.org/works/20994830/chapters/49927112 Spice Force Logic: Mind Games]'' has [[Spice Girls| Melanie and Emma]] are taken to Mars following an accident on the Ira. As their original bodies were badly damaged, they were subjected to the [[Losing Your Head|Brukhonenko's Method]] and having their heads placed in "[[Brain In a Jar| cabinets]]" for the time being.
== [[Film]] ==
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* The villain in ''[[The World Is Not Enough]]'', who is still walking around as a bullet slowly works its way through his brain.
* In ''[[Star Wars]]'', Darth Vader lives in a life-support suit.
** The [[Expanded Universe]] has Palpatine [[Came Back Strong|get better. Much better.]] But [[The Dark Side]] corrupts his clone bodies, so he has to keep using new ones, and each new body is corrupted more quickly. Then his clone bodies are killed by [[The Starscream|his apprentices]]. There's a mild double subversion: He tries to possess Han and Leia's son
* The ''[[Final Destination]]'' films run on this; all the protagonists have somehow cheated death, and Fate is trying to redress the balance.
* The [[Artificial Human|Replicants]] in ''[[Blade Runner]]'' have a four year lifespan. In both, the movie and the tie-in game the antagonist Replicants attack their creator {{spoiler|who is already dead and has been replaced by a Replicant, possibly more than once}} so that he will extend their lifespans. Sadly, according to their creator, the limited lifespan is not a design
* In ''[[L: Change the World]]'', L gives himself 23 days to live in order to beat Light, sealing his death from the moment he writes his own name down in the Death Note. The rest of the movie he spends trying to solve one last case before he dies.
* Literal example: In [[In Time]], lifespan has become a currency. Naturally, a number of poor people are in debt, and thus literally living on borrowed time.
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== [[Literature]] ==
* In ''[[Discworld]]'', Albert is a wizard who took the opportunity to work for Death rather than die. Thanks
** Coin's father in ''Sourcery'' places his soul and mind in Coin's staff to try and cheat Death that way. It is at best a qualified success.
** Happens twice in ''Reaper Man''.
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== [[Live-Action TV]] ==
* After Desmond prevents {{spoiler|Charlie}}'s death in ''[[Lost]]'', he becomes perpetually suspended in Death because [[You Can't Fight Fate]].
* ''[[The New Avengers]]'' had an episode about an enemy agent who had a bullet working its way toward his brain, and was desperate to kill Steed before that happened.
* Burai of ''[[Kyoryu Sentai Zyuranger]]''. His days were numbered- literally. He already died once before the events of the series when his sleep chamber collapsed while he was still inside during his suspended animation, but Clotho, the Spirit of Life, revived him to assist the Zyurangers, but only for a limited period. Burai's remaining time was represented by a flickering green candle that would gradually
** When he came back, Tommy, the [[Mighty Morphin Power Rangers|American equivalent]], knew he had only a few morphs before he would [[Never Say "Die"|lose his powers]]. ''[[Power Rangers Lightspeed Rescue]]'' gave us another [[Sixth Ranger]] who was ''actually''
* In ''[[Babylon 5]]'', captain John Sheridan was killed but later revived with an infusion of life energy. He is later told that he only has a maximum of twenty years left before this energy burns out.
== [[Tabletop Games]] ==
* In ''[[Warhammer
** Also, from the same setting, the Ultramarine Primarch Roboute Guilliman, who was also stabbed in the throat with a poisoned sword and frozen in permanent stasis field just moments before death. An [[Urban Legend]] says that he is regenerating despite it being physically impossible in the stasis.
** In the game itself, there's the Black Templars Chaplain Grimaldus - who has a special rule called ''Only in Death does Duty End'', permitting him to ignore fatal wounds as long as he continues to hold his nerve and focus on the Emperor's Will, although it's specified that even if this lets him finish out the battle, he's considered to die at the end.
* In the 3.5 ''[[Dungeons
{{quote|A life cut short. A quest left unfinished. One more task to be done. }}
** Can count as [[Miles to Go Before I Sleep]], and is thus on that page too.
** In 3.5 proper, ''The Book of Exalted Deeds'' gives us the Risen Martyr [[Prestige Class]]. Someone who has died in the name of a good cause is brought back and granted special powers to fulfill that cause. When the work is finished or they have reached eleven levels after the point of the resurrection (whichever comes first), the Risen Martyr is taken bodily into the Higher Planes and granted whatever reward is waiting for them.
* ''[[Magic: The Gathering]]'', always eager to have every applicable trope, gives us fading and vanishing. A character with fading X has X fade counters, and each of its controller's turns, that player removes one fade counter or sacrifices it. Vanishing is the same, only once the last time counter is removed, the card is sacrificed. Uses for this vary from "make a creature cheaper" to actually tying removing counters to its ability.
* In [[Ravenloft]], Gennifer Weathermay-Foxgrove is given a pocket watch literally named ''Borrowed Time'' by a Vistani, which she later returns. The watch's powers are somewhat vague in the narrative, but it's implied that using it will save the user's life at the expense of making her death inevitable at some point in the indeterminate future.
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* This is implied to be what is happening to {{spoiler|the Main Character}} in ''[[Persona 3]]'' in the aftermath of the final battle-- [[The Determinator|kept alive only]] by the [[Heroic Willpower|strength]] of [[The Promise|a promise]] [[The Power of Friendship|to meet again]] [[Exact Time to Failure|after graduation]].
* In ''[[Nethack]]'' if you use a scroll of genocide on your normal race while polymorphed into something else, "you feel dead inside" and [[The Dev Team Thinks of Everything|will die should you change back]]. If you quit, the death message is "quit while already on Charon's boat".
* In ''[[Dragon Age|Dragon Age: Origins]]'', {{spoiler|Wynne}} is dead, but being kept alive by a benevolent spirit of the Fade. She doesn't know how long the spirit will choose to keep her alive.
** The spirit is fused with her, so it doesn't have any choice in the matter
** ''All'' Grey Wardens fit this trope. To gain their darkspawn senses and taint immunity, they take in a cocktail of Darkspawn blood and partially transform. Unfortunately, the immunity isn't total. Eventually, the taint drives them mad with neverending prophetic dreams of Darkspawn as the taint takes over their minds. At that point, Senior Wardens retreat to the Deep Roads and choose to go out in a blaze of glory against the Darkspawn.
*** The ''Awakening'' expansion reveals that [[Blessed with Suck|mages]] are immune to this particular side-effect of the taint
* In ''[[Fate/stay night]]'', this happens to {{spoiler|Shirou}} in the normal end of the Heaven's Feel route. Running only on pure determination to stop {{spoiler|Angra Mainyu}}, he manages to {{spoiler|project Excalibur and destroy the Grail}}, even after his mind has long been destroyed and his body is constantly being destroyed by blades.
* This happens to {{spoiler|Alcatraz}} in Crysis 2. {{spoiler|He sustains fatal wounds from the Ceph gunship attack in the ''opening cutscene'', but the Nanosuit keeps him alive - even if that means ''growing into his wounds'' to keep him going.}}
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== [[Western Animation]] ==
* Charlie in ''[[All Dogs Go to Heaven]]'' comes [[Back
* Rasputin in ''[[Anastasia]]''.
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