Life in the Desert (Greetings with people)

Squad 3 had left Konoha a while ago and had long crossed the boarder into the land of wind. True to the name, the hot sun and stinging winds were hard to keep out. Luckily, Yasha had prepared cloaks for all his students. It was times like thats that Shao had an admiration for his sensei. Even though he could be strict at times with any sensei, he was more caring and showed times when he understood his students. It was more than his own father ever did.

Shao kept point next to his sensei while Mari was behind him.

"Goooood... kill me now," Kyle groaned, dragging his feet behind him in the sand.

Mari turned to look at Kyle as he complained. his hood was off to cool off but the sun was making his tanned skin much redder. "Kyle-kun, you should keep your hood on. Here have some water," she offered a jug of water for him.

He took the water for a deep sip, but still held his head back. "This heat is killing me. Remind me again why we had to come to this stinkin place?"

Shao turned to his complaining teammate. "We are here for an exchange program to the Hidden sand. Yasha told us, remember, or did the heat make you forget?" Shao explained calmly, "We are to aid them with missions and also represet the strong alliance we had with them. This is important. Besides, when the Chunin exams happen, they may be hosting them this year. We would have to make the trip anyway."

"Those hidden sand jerks must not be human to survive this heat," Kyle grumbled, reluctantly pulling on his hood.

"Don't be rude!" Mari whined, trying to talk reason to her teammate. "Master yasha and the hidden leaf are counting on us to make a good impression. This is as much of a mission as anything else. So can you try to act a little more civil?"

"WHat's civil?" Kyle asked.

Shao felt the urge to bury his head in the sand. How in the world did Kyle get so far as to be on his team... but that was his own selfish thoughts. As much as they were friends now, Kyle had a bad habit of doing obliviously annoying things.

"We don't have much further to travel," Yasha announced to them. The village is just beyond that rocky ridge there. He said and pointed to a series of cliffs not too far in the dunes.

THough at a slow pace due to Kyle, the four of them made their way west towards the village. With any luck they would arrive within an hour...

(Shao and his squad are now in Suna)

Fuu kicked her feet in the air from the edge of the cliff, her uncle was on the ground below keeping his eye on the horizon. "Why did you bring Fuu with you for this boring stuff uncle." She asked for the thousandth time. Of course she knew why they were there, but it was boring just sitting in the one spot waiting for someone to show up. Her uncle ignored her, he had realized that answering her would get him nowhere in the getting her to stop asking front.  Instead he continued scanning the horizon until he spotted the group traveling.

"They are here! Fuu get down here and at least act like you know how to behave. I brought you here because these ninja will be staying at our house while they are here and I want you to be nice. Fuu rolled her eyes, of course they would strap her clan with taking care of them, no real chance of secret leaking when your care takers were always suspicious of you. He obviously had no faith that Fuu was going to be nice if he didn't force her to interact with them.

"I got it I got it. I'll be nice as long as they are-" she was cut off. "even if they are rude Fuu. We can't have our clan starting an incident with a diplomatic group." Fuu just pouted at him.

Finally the group was within talking range and they moved to go greet them.

"Are we there yet...?" Kyle groaned, once again whining. "Are we there yet...?"

"Kyle," Shao warned in a weary voice of his own, "You're nagging is more brutal than the heat. Please keep quiet..." Shao warned but soon the distance closed.

Yasha stopped and urged his students to stop as well. They soon approached the cliff-- and were greeted by three sand shinobi that easily seemed to appear out of thin air.

"State your business." one of the sand shinobi demanded. He wore a sand headband with a cloth over his head, clearly to protect him from the heat.

"We are shinobi of the leaf here for a diplomatic exchange, " Yasha spoke on behalf of the group. "You're superiors are expecting us."

Perhaps it was the mask that Yasha wore, but he always seemed to command a strong respect from those around him. Shao looked towards his master, then the sand ninja. After a brief moment, they turned to him. "Please wait... We must check with our commanding officer to be sure. "

"Can we at least wait in the shade? I'm roasting here..." Kyle groaned---

THUD! Mari gave Kyle a light blow to the gut, causing him to fall to his knees in the sand. "I'm sorry, please pardon our friend's manners." Mari added with a polite bow.  Shao raised a brow at this. The heat must have gotten to her too. He never seen her hurt a fly.

It was then the third shinobi returned, along with a young girl and older shinobi. "Greetings shinobi of the leaf. I hope your trip has not been a brutal one. This is the summer season after all," he said.

"Its nice to meet you. " Yasha said and Shao bowed in silent greeting. "I'm captain Yasha and this is my team. Shao, Mari and ...."

"Ugh... water..." Kyle complained as he laid on the sand... "wait... i think i see rain clouds. "

Shao covered his forehead with his hand to hide his shame. Yasha even had a quirk to his mouth to show his embarrassment of his student. "And the hallucinating boy is Kyle. Might we adjourn this inside where its cooler... before he goes after a mirage."

Shao silently looked to the girl at the captain of the sand ninja's side, interested in her firm stare. It seemed intense, but he kept a cool demeanor and lifted his hood off, to reveal his features-- including his white eyes.

As Mari reluctantly helped Kyle back to his feet, he too noticed the girl. "Hey... who is that salamander over there? It looks funny," he said, clearly hallucinating-- or a thinly veiled insult.

Shao cringed at the bloodshed to come. "It was nice knowing you Kyle..." he sighed.