Minseok is still trying to take it all in. He’s debuting. He’s actually debuting! All the sweat and tears he’s shed while training haven’t been in vain. He’s debuting with the next group. 

He’s been repeating that thought for hours, but it’s still hard to believe. Looking at the guys around him, everyone seems to have similar thoughts. They are all trying to look like they are listening very hard to what the SM employees in charge of their debut are saying, but he can tell only half of the information reaches them. 

The employees are explaining something about how all eleven of them are going to debut as one huge group. He hears them mention something about superpowers too, something about aliens and some red color. Feeling happy and slightly dizzy, he just nods at everything. He doesn’t stop to think what superpowers have to do with them debuting, he doesn’t care really. He’ll take anything and everything just to have that first stage surrounded by new fans arrive sooner. He’s so happy. Everyone in the room is so happy.

Everyone except one.

Minseok’s smile falters when he looks at the person next to him. Lu Han isn’t smiling. Lu Han isn’t happy. Lu Han looks like this is the worst day of his life.

Lu Han isn’t debuting.

Minseok really tried to figure out how to make the ghost debut. He knew the task was next to impossible, but somehow…somehow he had still been hopeful. Perhaps not by debuting, but surely there was a way for Lu Han to find peace. If there wasn’t, the world would be filled with ghosts. But no matter how many hours he scrolled through Naver, nothing came up, nothing at all. He’s seen the frustration on Lu Han’s face and he knows the situation isn’t fair to him.

Like it isn’t fair to Minseok either. He should have made Lu Han find peace ages ago already. When he still wasn’t as attached to the ghost. Now it’s too late. He considers a dead person to be one of his best friends and it isn’t okay. He understands why Lu Han rarely leaves his side (except for the last two or three weeks when he had gone into hiding for some reason. Minseok had made him promise never to do it again), the ghost had been all alone before Minseok noticed him after all. But he was never supposed to grow so close to Lu Han. He blames himself for that carelessness. 

He’s not sure what or who to blame later in the night, when he lets Lu Han sleep in his bed. Lu Han doesn’t even sleep, he’ll probably just creepily stare at his face all night as usual. Maybe it’s because the ghost has been unnaturally quiet these past days, ever since he told him he was debuting, that he wants to make him feel comfortable in any way possible.

“Hey,” he whispers, turning to face Lu Han. “Don’t you worry. I got you. I’ll find a way. I promise.” He’s made the same promise several times already, but it’s never a bad thing to remind Lu Han that he doesn’t plan to abandon him just because he’s debuting.

“We still have time,” Minseok murmurs, draping his arm around Lu Han. He won’t be able to hold it up for many minutes, but he hopes Lu Han at least appreciated the gesture. He’s not entirely sure what he means by his own words. They still have time to figure out how to make him debut or they still have time to spend together? 

Lu Han smiles weakly. “It’s fine, Minseok. You can give up now. You’re debuting so you should focus on that.”

“Lying doesn’t suit your stupid, pretty face,” Minseok tells him right away and pinches Lu Han’s nose. Or at least tries to. Lu Han isn’t exactly solid enough for him to touch him. His concentration has been shabby lately and he hasn’t been able to touch him at all.

Lu Han seems to realise Minseok wasn’t fooled by his cool act, because he snuggles closer to him. They aren’t quite touching, but close enough that normally Minseok would dig out the spoons and threaten him with them. But that was before they had a deadline for their friendship.

“I don’t wanna be alone again…” Lu Han quietly whines against Minseok’s pillow. 

Minseok touches his long hair, briefly imagining how the strands would feel against his fingers if Lu Han was still alive. How he wishes he was still alive. He even wishes it over his own debut. But that’s not something he’ll ever tell him. He doesn’t want to make Lu Han more depressed.

“You won’t be alone. I won’t leave you alone,” Minseok tells him instead. Even if he debuts and Lu Han is stuck in the SM trainee building…he will figure out a way to keep seeing him until he finds his peace…somehow…

Minseok eventually falls asleep to these thoughts, his arm resting against the spot Lu Han was just a minute ago. 

When he wakes up, the first thing he sees is Lu Han’s face as usual. Instead of getting annoyed or creeped out, Minseok greets the ghost with a smile. Surprisingly, Lu Han grins back. His foul mood of the past days seems to have vanished somewhere overnight. Before Minseok can demand an explanation for the smile, Lu Han’s already talking.

“I have a plan, Baozi!”

Ignoring the dumb nickname Lu Han likes to use, Minseok sits up properly on his bed. Normally he would demand to drink a cup of coffee before listening to any sort of plans, but nothing he does with Lu Han is normal.

“Yeah?” Minseok asks and hopes whatever Lu Han has come up with is good. Even if it means that soon he won’t be able to see him anymore.

Lu Han tells him his plan and Minseok doesn’t know if he should roll his eyes or be excited. Still, it’s not the worst plan ever. It’s actually pretty decent, there’s just no telling if it will really succeed or not.

The plan goes something like this (according to Lu Han): During those nights that Lee Sooman spends in the SM office because he’s too busy to go home to sleep, Lu Han will keep whispering suggestions of a dead boy debuting into his ear the whole night.

That’s it. That’s the whole plan. When Minseok goes over it again in his head he finally realises it’s absolutely ridiculous. Who in their right mind would wanna debut a dead person? Even if it was for his memory’s sake. Besides, there’s no way it will work. No one else except him can even see Lu Han. How could Sooman hear his words, asleep or not? But all those reasons don't mean they won’t try it. Of course they will try it. 

A week later Minseok watches as Lu Han floats away. He’s been spying on Sooman a lot these days and today’s finally the day the big boss is going to spend the night in the office. Lu Han’s going to spend the whole night with him, whispering things into his ear (Minseok shivers, because somehow that sounded very wrong). He bids Lu Han farewell and goes to sleep in his own bed alone. It feels almost too huge now that Lu Han isn’t occupying the other side. But it’s something he should get used to again.

He falls asleep listening to Chanyeol and Jongdae being way too loud in the next room. He hopes their weird plan works. He hopes Lu Han can find peace.

But he also hopes there will be a way to keep seeing the ghost even after he’s finally gone to the afterlife.

---

Six hours later, when the first rays of the morning sun reach the highest point of the SM office building, Lee Sooman suddenly wakes up with a bizarre idea in his head.

EXO will be 12, not 11.