“Well, Reaper, you haven’t been too lucky, have you? You didn’t get your soul back and you’ve lost your immortality. Farewell.” The old woman cracked her whip and an invisible elastic wave whacked off the necromancer’s head.

Two demons immediately dragged the headless corpse away.

“Well, anyone else want to try terminating their Contract? Come on, go ahead or you’ll have to wait another year.” The Madam glanced at her slaves. Her gaze settled on one. “Are you also tired of wielding your sickle, Reaper?”

“I am,” he replied, trying not to look away. It wasn’t easy to withstand the glare of Death, but the necromancer did it.

“Okay, slave. Let’s play then. Let’s see if you’re lucky.” The old woman paused, rolled her eyes, and began to select a victim from the world of the living as she wove through space, navigating along invisible threads like a spider waiting in ambush.

Finally, her eyes returned to normal and her gaze settled on the Reaper’s nose again.

“There. Your ‘lucky’ fellow is already preparing a bath. I’d like to remind you of the terms…”

The necromancer knew the Terms by heart, but if he dared to interrupt the Madam at that moment the game would be over before it had even begun. So he chose to remain silent.

Beating Death is not an easy thing to do. Many have tried, but no one knows whether anyone has ever succeeded.

The Reaper wanted to regain the soul he had exchanged for immortality hundreds of years before at any cost. This is why he agreed to risk that very immortality, the only thing a necromancer possessed, not to speak of the murky privilege to work like plantation slaves collecting the souls of the dead for the old woman.

At the same time, some poor unknown man somewhere on Earth has only a few minutes left to live before the old woman would finish reading the Terms.

So she quickly kills the ‘lucky’ fellow, which marks the beginning of the game. As soon as the soul of the slain (soul… is this the word from the long-forgotten past?!) leaves the body, the timer begins counting the seconds. The Reaper will have to wrest the poor wretch from the grasp of Death and take care of him for three days, handling it with caution, as though it were a fragile crystal glass that the Madam would be making every effort to steal and ‘break’.

“... And if the victim is still alive after three days, Death will release his soul,” Madam stated in a high-pitched voice. “Then you may collect your soul and be free. But the necromancer must not descend to murder the victim. He may, but only through someone else’s hands. However, very few have achieved this. It is only three days after all. You’ll figure it out as you go. Begin!”

She waved her whip, sending the long thin snake whistling and wrapping around the slave’s neck. One jerk later and an elastic force yanked the necromancer from the underworld to the bustling land of the living to which he so wanted to return.

“Maybe I’ll even get to die like a human… Or if I’m lucky enough, then...”

***

The withered old man undressed and, still in his underpants, sat on the edge of the bathtub and threw a skinny leg over the side, helping himself into the tub using his arms. Then, with great difficulty, he moved the second leg into the bathtub. His old muscles straining, he carefully sank into the warm water. The level rose, and excess water poured into the overflow hole. Suddenly, something clicked and buzzed from the corridor, and the old man’s body arched, spasming. Another click and the buzzing stopped. The old man’s body went limp and his head dipped under the water.

A few seconds later, the door opened hesitantly, revealing the frightened face of a young man around twenty. He stood there a moment, looking at his grandfather. The old man’s remaining gray hair spread out from a pinkish bald spot under the water, making his head look like a fancy white flower.

The young man entered, knelt down, and began to hastily pull thick wires from under the bathtub. He dragged them into the corridor before carrying out a heavy metal appliance that resembled a small chest from the bathroom.

The young man took the device and wires into his room and hid them under his bed.

“Hello? Yes. Everything seems to be alright. No. No, I haven’t. I haven’t checked yet. Come see for yourself if you’re so smart. He’s under the water, how on earth could he be breathing? Nothing. I’ve had enough of your advice. Okay, okay. I gotta call an ambulance and then father. Love you, too.”

“Hello, emergency services? My grandfather’s drowned in the bathroom. His full name is Vyzhivalov, Vitaliy Tikhonovich. Eighty-six. Border Street, building 11, apartment 43. Fourth floor. Alright, waiting.”

“Hi, Dad? Well, you know...Grandpa drowned in the bathtub. How? He was probably bathing and then dozed off. Dunno. Yep, I did. No, I didn’t touch him. Yes, well…” The boy heard the old man coughing up water.

“Yes, I’m fine. Come here ASAP,” the boy finished in an emotionless voice, hanging up the phone and rushing to the bathroom.

The old man lay on his side, choking up water. He was taking deep, gurgling breaths before hacking, his tongue lolling out and his eyes wide. There was no water in the bathtub. He must have accidentally knocked out the plug with his foot when his grandson switched on the power, but the young man didn’t notice that.

The boy fell to the floor and clasped his head in his hands. The approaching howl of a siren could be heard through the open window.

***

Two medical students were smoking at the top of the hospital staircase.

“So who’s the old man you have in ward 5?”

“He’s quite a lucky old man. It’s his third day so far. Guess what? He dozed off in the bathtub and went under. While his grandson called the ambulance, the old man revived. The ambulance arrived to certify his death only to find the old man still as fit as a fiddle! As when they were on the way to the hospital, a Toyota Land Cruiser t-boned them on the corner of Rainbow and Garden. The ambulance flipped onto its side. Semyonovich got a concussion, Maria a broken ankle, and you know what? The old man was left without a scratch! Can you believe it? He was there asking what had happened.”

“Unbelievable luck…”

“That’s not all. At first, he was assigned to ward 7, which has recently been renovated. And then he was nearly killed by a chandelier, can you imagine?”

“A chandelier?”

“Yeah, that huge chandelier, you know. The builders must have failed to secure it properly. Anyways, the old man had been lying there the whole time, and then, for some inexplicable reason, he jumped up as the chandelier above him crashed down, right on the pillow where his head had just been! Everything was covered by plaster and broken glass and the lamp crashed against the headboard.”

“I asked him, ‘Why did you jump up like that, you lucky duck?’ He was totally calm.. He said, ‘It was just a familiar voice that called out to me, so I listened and sat up.’ Can you imagine? The nurses have been calling him MacLeod since yesterday.”

“MacLeod indeed…”

“And he certainly lived up to the name.”

“What do you mean?”

“Today they took him to tomography, which is in Building 6. Well, you know that there’s a slope where cars can't drive uphill in the winter because of the ice, which meant he had to be pushed. So Victor, the nurse, was pushing him when he stumbled, his slippers flying off, causing him to let go of the gurney with MacLeod. And it rolled down the road. Victor said, ‘This is the end. He’ll kick the bucket this time.’ The gurney gathered speed within seconds. Then there’s a turn, a gutter, and then a slope right down to the lower building.”

“And then what!?”

“You wouldn’t believe it. It turns out that this morning, right behind the curb, three dump trucks of sand were poured there. Construction started and they wanted to shore up the area so that the higher building wouldn’t collapse down the hill. In short, the gurney strikes the curb and flips over, sending MacLeod flying over and below the horizon. Victor runs to the slope and our ‘Mr. Immortality’ is sunbathing on the sand right next to the gurney. He even went on to comfort Victor, making sure the poor boy didn't keel over from a heart attack."

“Hmm, if anyone other than you had told me this, I wouldn’t have believed such bad luck existed or, I don’t even know… that such luck happens.”

“I know! It shocked me too!”

***

The grandson asked the nurse if he could be alone with the old man and that she not interrupt. If there was an emergency, he would call for help. The boy was sitting on a chair next to the dozing old man, holding a pillow on his knees, which he wanted to use to quietly suffocate his grandfather before running to the nurse and telling her the old man had suddenly fallen gravely ill. And then that would be it.

But the boy's mind was being torn in two from the conundrums raging inside and he dared not cover the old man's face with the pillow.

To kill or not to kill? Or maybe stop following Svetlana’s lead and refuse to follow through with this idea that, in fact, he hadn’t liked from the very beginning. Especially now, when it had become clear that their endeavor was meant to be a complete failure.

The grandson was thoughtfully examining the fresh abrasions and scratches along the grandfather’s waxy forehead. Yes, the old man had gotten pretty roughed up over the past few days...

Suddenly, he felt his phone vibrate. It was Svetlana. The boy answered the phone, covering it with his hand and whispering, “Yes. Nothing. Why? I’m sitting next to him. No, I haven’t done it. Because today ends in ‘y’. I don’t like all this. I told you already. The apartment isn’t worth it. And how do you think I will be able to live in it? Have you thought about that? What does it have to do with being a man or not? Go to hell, you stupid cow. We’re done….” The younger man hid the phone and looked at his grandfather, who was already watching him.

“Grandson?” The old man weakly asked.

“Why aren’t you sleeping, Grandpa? You need to rest.”

“I wanted to tell you something. Yeah, I know that old people can’t make heads or tails of all your young affairs, but there’s one thing I’d like to tell you. Leave her, Nikita. She doesn’t need you. She wants our apartment and she’s furious you failed to get rid of me in the bathroom.”

“You knew about it all this time? Why didn’t you say anything?”

“What for? We’re all fools when we’re young. Do you think I didn’t use to be stupid? Anyways, it’s all in the past. Let’s forget it. Break up with this Svetlana. She has no soul. Just greed and anger. Now go home. I’ll be okay. Come back tomorrow.” The old man closed his eyes, his breathing becoming as even and calm as a baby’s.

He dreamt of July, 1943. Vitaly Vyzhivalov, a nineteen-year-old private, was in some unfamiliar village, climbing into the burning hut of the local ‘witch'. The hut was in flames after the bombing. He rushed back at the sound of a child's cry and carried out a half-dead, dirty, little girl of about seven with huge black eyes. The dark-haired witch had the same bottomless pitch-black eyes as her daughter as she silently took Vitaly's hand and looked at his palm. Then, she ran her thumb across his forehead from top to bottom. Instead of gratitude in her eyes, she uttered just four simple words: "Die whenever you want to." In Vitaly's mind, everything began to spin, the world grew dimmer, and when the hallucination subsided both the witch and her daughter were gone.

The old man opened his eyes. He was alone in the ward. The memory of seventy years ago stood before his eyes, fresh and bright. Vitaly automatically dragged his thumb across his forehead from top to bottom. He still didn’t want to die, which meant it wasn’t time yet.

The pillow that Nikita had kept on his lap was now lying neatly on the next bed.

The old man looked out the window to see the setting sun, although it was still far above the horizon.

***

“It seems you’re out of luck too, Reaper. You lasted the longest. Your ‘lucky’ fellow lasted three days, something few have ever done. But you couldn’t get the soul from this old man.” The old woman cracked the whip, and an invisible elastic wave whacked off the necromancer’s head.