Oh I see now. I saw your initial note about waiting, and I figured it would make sense in gameplay. Clearly I was still missing the point, haha. I actually think if you incorporated a visual element to the enemies as they are beamed up, it would solve it. For example, once you start to beam them up, they start to turn green from the bottom up, like a thermometer, and once they turn completely green, that will signal that you can touch them and collect them. There can be a little sound that coincides with them being ready, too. If you drop them, then the color would fade and you'd have to do it again. Hope that is clear!
That is a great idea! Although i do not know how i would go on doing that, perhaps using a shader, but for now i made a tutorial, there is just a image on the itch page for now, because i cannot change the game files right now as the jam is still ongoing, but i will upload it when it allows me to! Here is the image if you wanna see it right now:
