They had all made it to the lakeside warehouse. It was made of even more windows than the first building they were in but the view of the lake was blocked almost entirely by hissing crates. 

This warehouse was almost double the size of the one Keeya cleared out. 

Keeya felt her blood pump with anticipation and then looked over to the other squad. Meg was going over the songs they were going to do. 

Hurry up and use your magic so i can heal you guys! 

Like most warehouse crews they were a team of idols, a whole marching band in fact! There were almost one hundred of them scattered around the outer edge of Chicago each working on clearing out warehouses. 

Meg’s squad was the drum-line. There were eight of them total and they altered shifts. 

One of the crates closest to Keeya hissed aggressively. The sound sent chills down her spine having lived her whole life on alert for that sound. 

There were so many crates that it sounded like a sprinkler system. Keeya started imagining what would happen if she used her power like when they were overrun at her school. She would really be the hero then! How cool!

“I think that one likes you,” Marcella said taking Keeya out of her daydream of golden sparkles.

“What? Who?” 

“The snake new girl. Anyway you’ll be sticking with me and I’ll teach you how to recharge people. Since there are two of us we can tag people. I’ll get Joy, Marco, and Meg. You can get the others.”

Keeya smirked. “Afraid your bedside manner won’t make you any new friends?”

Marcella laughed and bumped Keeyas shoulder.

“Oh she’s got jokes now. Someone i s settling in quickly.” 

Keeya beamed but then looked around more seriously.

“Shouldn’t we be looking around? You know for the… the big ones?” 

Marcella shook her head then rolled her shoulders making her leather jacket creak. 

“No, I think if there is one here it would’ve been taken away by now. But there are a lot more adults than usual so maybe one did come by and like us they are waiting on a new wave to roll in,” Marcella explained.

“Oh,” Keeya said. But this was a good thing. Now she could just focus on her training, and not the running laps part. 

A half hour later the two teams were in their new formation. The drum line fanned out, walking side by side, Marco and Joyce took to the left next to Meg with Marcella behind and then Keeya behind the other three. 

Marcella had given her another lesson on how to disperse her Dawns Light. 

It wasn’t lost on Keeya how this power was used to create amazing feats for magical kids but completely destroyed the invading snakes. 

But she had never had time to wonder why. She was so hyper fixated on becoming a magical kid. She probably could have put it together after watching the videos with as much devotion as her best friend, but if she watched too many of them she felt a sharp splinter of envy. 

“Keeya try recharging, remember focus the light on your tags only and not out to in mass. It’s not our job to clean out the warehouse,” Marcella said. 

“Right,” Keeya said begrudgingly. She felt so full of the stuff she figured she coukd do both. 

An odd memory came to her then. Her dad and she would play with water guns every summer. Sometimes the whole neighborhood would be in on it. One time she got her dad square in the back and she watched fascinated as the wet spot spread out from where she’d hit him. 

What if she did the same with Dawns Light? She could shoot them with a stream of it and then it would radiate throughout from there. 

So if Keeya focused on the drumline. Their back stiff and crisp as their uniforms were the perfect target. 

She pointed her staff the light gathering in the eight pointed star

A small but bright beam shot out and hit the back of Moon Moon. As she continued to pour out light she saw a golden glow as if his Dawns Light was welcoming her. 

“Hey thanks for that!” Moon moon said between beats. The drum beats were infectious. Keeya felt the urge to dance from her success. 

Focus Keeya. Got to keep working down the line. 

The team was currently going down the middle aisle of the warehouse, cages full of snakes on either side. At the end was a T juncture where the drum-line would normally split in two. But now it was going to be the two healers teams. Keeya on one side and Marcella on the other. 

As part of her training Keeya would practice like this for the next few weeks, the normal time one would train at HQ. 

But then what? 

From the shadows near the ceiling a spectator was also enjoying the music. But as wave after wave of his creatures were extinguished he felt a frown tug the corners of his mouth. 

He then focused on each individual. The two “healers” he had drawn out a while ago were here. 

Interesting.

He needed to study these subjects more. 

“Time for you to march to the beat of my drum now.”

He removed his black glove revealing dark brown skin that was so dark it almost had a sapphire undertone. His dark blue cloak parted to reveal a royal blue military uniform. With a snap of his fingers all the glass cages shattered.