Time adjusted his breathing. He calculated distances and listened for sounds as soft as deep breaths. He had shifted into predator mode.
Directly to the left of the elevator, an attractive floor receptionist stood as the prince entered. As instructed, she bowed slightly without speaking. The prince acknowledged her with a subtle nod.
As Time passed by her, she smiled warmly at him and he smiled back. It crossed his mind that, despite her slightly flirtatious greeting, soon she could be labeled one of his targets. It had been deeply ingrained in him that the moment Edgar Treeves identified a target, that individual was no longer to be considered a human being. Rather, targets were only walking talking collections of opportunities for Time to neutralize them the instant Treeves signaled him to do so.
Time knew that multi-opponent close-order combat was chaos. A random shot or a knife scoring a few centimeters to the left or right could decide the outcome. No one had control over luck or destiny. Therefore, he focused on variables that would provide him with the edge he needed to eliminate targets as quickly as possible with a minimal amount of collateral damage.
The most important variable was Edgar Treeves. When the moment arrived to make the key decisions of who should go down and in what order, it was Treeves who gave him that vital information.
There were hundreds of silent signals Treeves could convey to Time in one way or another. They were separated into categories, some requiring patience, others instantaneous reaction.
The two of them had practiced for countless hours. Once they were certain a signal was clear, they practiced it again a hundred times.