After shaking hands and sending a friendly smile to the ambassadors of the other countries belonging to the UN, Diana Prince sat down in her seat, ready to finally begin this meeting which had as its main theme diplomatic relations between states around the world, which was why she was there as that was her specialty.
There was a reason why she was the main diplomatic and peace ambassador not only of the USA but practically of the whole world: after all, it was her credit for having managed to prevent a potential armed conflict from breaking out between Russia and Ukraine by arriving to compromises that both sides accepted and, even if her proposals damaged the interests of the United States a little, this did not matter to her at all since the only thing that mattered was having avoided the outbreak of a war.
As Diana absentmindedly followed the discussion, her mind wandered to the events that had occurred a few days earlier.
Following increasingly tense relations between Russia and Ukraine, she had decided to convene an emergency meeting in a neutral territory like Geneva -where there was one of the UN headquarters, although the main one was in New York but for obvious reasons she chose that of Switzerland- in which she had personally requested the exclusive presence of the Russian president, the Ukrainian one, their ministers and herself who played the role of mediator and diplomat between the two states.
There was a high risk of a possible armed conflict between the two states that could even lead to a World War III, which is why she necessarily had to put an end to it immediately. In this way, with her strong, determined and resolute personality, Diana managed to reach compromises for both nations, thus avoiding a hypothetical war that would have only brought countless deaths and destruction in which, in the end, there would have been no winner or defeated.
From that moment her fame and prestige on an international level increased further, although it did not interest her at all: she was simply happy and satisfied with herself for having successfully avoided the outbreak of a war.
Later that same day, when she returned to Washington, in her home she found another beautifully colored bouquet of gerberas with another note that read:
Excellent and flawless work, Princess. Congratulations are in order for having avoided the outbreak of a war that could have led to World War III. Always said that you are the best, Princess ;)
From your favorite mercenary friend, Renegade.
The Amazon's reaction was to smile affectionately at Renegade's cute and pleasant gesture and his beautiful words and this time she did not hesitate at all in taking care of this bouquet of gerberas too, placing it in another corner of the house that required more color and embellishment.
At that moment her chest burst with happiness and warmth and it was one of the best feelings she had ever felt.
Diana returned to the present, just in time to reconnect with the speech of the Spanish ambassador who was responding to a question posed by the representative of Australia.
"…and that's why we should-"
The demigoddess was the first of all to turn around, even before the doors of the meeting room were slammed violently. Her muscles immediately tensed when five men armed with AK-47 rifles, masked by ski masks and wearing military flak jackets abruptly burst into the room, shouting in a language she didn't recognize.
She ignored the gasps and terrified, panicked sounds of her colleagues, ready to kick these criminals/terrorists' asses, regardless of her secret identity.
She wouldn't hesitate for even a second to reveal her identity as Wonder Woman to the entire world if it meant saving one person's life, let alone nearly two hundred.
Diana expected them to start shooting as soon as they set foot in the room and she was already ready to deflect all the bullets with her bracelets that she always wore, hidden by the sleeves of her shirts. Instead, she was surprised when their eyes wandered from one ambassador to another.
They almost certainly have a single precise target to eliminate.
Just when she was about to deal with them with her diplomatic skills and make them see sense, telling them that this would be their biggest bullshit ever and that they would be persecuted by practically the entire world, a criminal's eyes fell on of her and remained fixed.
The terrorist shouted in his native language which she did not know, attracting the attention of his comrades who were holding all the ambassadors at gunpoint, and he pointed in her direction.
Alarm bells rang in her head and she immediately came to the conclusion.
Oh, well. I'm the target.
Before Diana could fly with her immense supernatural speed and take down all the terrorists before they even had a chance to shoot her, suddenly one of the windows shattered loudly and blood and brain matter violently splattered away from the man who had pointed at her. The other terrorists suddenly turned towards the direction from which the window broke and in less than 3 seconds two more shots rang out deafeningly and shrill, killing as many criminals.
The last two gunmen shouted in their own language -and Diana suspected they were panicking or something, judging by their body language- and turned towards her, making her tense up. However, they had no time to do anything at all as two more shots followed within a few hundredths of a second, killing them in cold blood.
For a brief moment a tense and heavy silence reigned which was finally broken by Diana who turned to the other ambassadors. "We should be safe now but it's better stay under the table and call security immediately and if they don't respond, alert the local authorities." she ordered, instinctively taking command of the situation.
She waited for a few shaky nods before standing up and heading in the direction of the dead terrorists. She examined all five corpses and noticed that each of them had a bloody hole either between the eyes or right in the brain: in any case they never had even the slightest chance of survival given the fatality of their wounds that killed them on the spot, without even giving them the opportunity to understand what the hell was going on.
The princess of Themyscira's gaze shifted to the side, observing the shattered window that theoretically should have been highly bulletproof. She approached the window and her eyes moved outward, looking in particular at the different buildings that flanked the UN base, but she didn't notice any oddities or anything out of the ordinary. She turned and mentally calculated the angle of trajectory from the various buildings that could be seen to the corpses of the terrorists and, although she was not the most expert in mathematical calculations, everything roughly matched.
It was definitely a sniper. And a very experienced, skilled and lethal one since firing five shots so quickly requires a mastery of the weapon unique in the world, not to mention being aware of and possessing the caliber capable of breaking through bulletproof glass.
Although it might have been quite obvious, she had witnessed things that were definitely out of the ordinary, so being certain wasn't a bad thing at all.
"By any chance, every time we get together there are snipers who have the task of monitoring us and protecting us in cases like these?" she asked, turning to stare at the other people in the room.
Most of them shook their heads. "No. There are only security guards outside the facility and outside the meeting room but no snipers." the Canadian ambassador replied.
"No one from internal security responded, so I contacted local authorities." the Liechtenstein representative informed them in a trembling voice, clearly still shaken by the whole affair.
Diana sent them a nod and her eyes fell on her colleague from Japan when he spoke. "It seemed as if they specifically wanted to eliminate you, Mrs. Prince."
"I noticed it too and that was most likely the case." she confirmed with a sigh. "Although I don't know why."
Afterwards she ignored the chatter in the background and returned her attention to the broken window, or to be more precise, what was outside it.
It's as if I had some sort of guardian sniper who saved my life. Or rather, prevented me from revealing my identity as Wonder Woman.
A sudden thought flashed through her mind and her heart skipped a beat.
Maybe it was him. I honestly wouldn't be surprised at all if that were the case.
"I'm going out for a moment to clear my head a bit." she announced loudly, getting everyone's attention. "If the local authorities arrive, tell them I will show up in a few minutes. I need some time alone." she lied.
After dismissing their concerns -futile but welcome nonetheless- by telling them that she would be fine and that the threat had been neutralized, she left the meeting room and headed for the bathroom and, certain that no one else was there, she he opened the small window at the top and exited the UN facility, flying away towards the general direction from which the shots were coming.
It didn't take long to glimpse a small figure on the roof of a huge building about 300 meters from the UN base and in less than two seconds she closed the distance thanks to her supernatural speed. She remained floating in mid-air, her eyes widening as she immediately recognized the figure.
"I knew it wouldn't take you long to find me, Princess."