The sun was just starting to crest over the cliffs which were the foundation of many buildings that comprised the majority of Iwagakure's structure. The softer rays of early morning light gained an additional brilliance as they reflected off of the thin waterfalls that cascaded down many a rock-face along the borders of the village. Certainly, Iwagakure lacked the appeal of warmth and greenery, but it had its own beauty if one cared to look.

Soku didn't bother.

The feral looking preteen stood in front of a pool at the base off the surrounding cliffs which was being fed from one of the aforementioned waterfalls. A scowl adorned her features, slitting her eyes past their normal point; she was an oddity among the people of Iwagakure, especially if they had never encountered those of the Leaf's Inuzuka clan before. Soku didn't necessarily mind the looks cast her way, but she did hate answering all the bothersome questions. Like the one about her father defecting from Konoha to begin with. Such a thing was far from her mind though as Soku plopped down on the hard stone around the natural basin of water. As she did so, a tawny and white pup jumped into her lap, yipping loudly.

"I know, Chairomaru, I can smell them too." Soku's eyes cast about the surroundings as she ran a hand over the dog's fur and then she sniffed at the air. "You can come out, I know you're there," she stated, seemingly to no one, but Soku knew better. A trait of her father's clan. The dog licked the red fang tattoo on her right cheek while they waited. It and its twin on the other side indicated that, by her father's standards, the Inuzuka ninpou had been passed on. The silver hitai-ate plate set upon soft yellow sash around her neck indicated in a similar manner, that Soku was a Genin.

A genin waiting for her two other squadmates and their instructor. What had their names been? Soku scrunched her nose up as she waited for the figures not yet seen to reveal themselves while she tried to think back to the day her team has been assigned during the last day of the academy. Ah, that was it. Shigeo and Kurisuna. Perhaps it was they who approached, unseen as of the moment.

At the Inuzuka's words, a nearby boulder was suddenly engulfed in a plume of smoke, a blond child with a pale, sickly pallor stepping forth with a scowl. "How'd you know I was here?" Shigeo asked, resentfully. "My Henge was perfect."

Fudari Shigeo was a thin child, short for his age, and seemingly always sick or on the verge of becoming so. While his physical frailty prevented him from gaining any proficiency in Taijutsu, his days in the academy had revealed great skill with Ninjutsu and especially Genjutsu. The praise from his instructors went to Shigeo's head, unfortunately, and his arrogance proved itself to be as impressive as his illusory skills.

Now he stood, arms folded over his thin chest, glowering with pale blue eyes at Soku. After several moments, he turned his gaze onto his surroundings, muttering, "Where the hell's the last girl...What's her name...Kirusanu...?" It seemed the Jounin who'd be heading the team was missing, as well. Wonderful.

''Kurisuna,'' rectified a feminine voice above the pair, its proprietor emerging from a swirl of sand, upside down, below an adjacent tree's jutting limb. The girl, lanky and red-haired, adhered to the bough, the soles of her sandals layered with a film of chakra as she simply hung there, her arms folded crossly. Though she didn't seem the part, Kurisuna was younger by two years; she possessed the ill-fated combination of an infernal temperament and a ludicrously vast chakra reserve to thank for her rise to Geninhood—the Academy didn't want her, nor did the tutors at her parents' estate. How better to remedy the situation than by having the unstable little shit graduate prematurely before dumping her on someone else?

A cursory glance of the training field told Kurisuna all she needed to know before locking an unfriendly glare upon that moron Shigeo and the more perceptive Soku, whose names she'd committed to memory in spite of never having shared a class with them; the trio was unsupervised, their Jounin instructor absent. It was as good an opportunity as any to assert her stance as the incurably belligerent member of the team, here, but, er... no. Perhaps later.

God fucking damn it she hated dogs.

The blonde plodded slowly along a short hill-path, winding down from one of the higher-elevated buildings near the edge of the village toward the little pool where word had been sent to the Genin to meet; as Reis walked, he shuffled three small scrolls in his hands, reading them over intermittently, apparently quite engrossed in the information - small dossier on the three students he was to be keeping his Jounin-eyes upon.

Though he made no effort toward hiding himself from the students, as the effort would surely be wasted by the fact that he'd simply be introducing himself to them a few moments away regardless, Reis also made no effort to make himself obvious to them. The stone cover alongside the pathway was minute to say the least, on average only reaching waist height though in places, yes, it did cover past the short topknot he kept his hair tied into. It was against one such stone the Jounin paused and sighed, rolling his neck and shoulders as he slid the information scrolls into a rather sizable pouch on his right leg, a large red cross adorning the front of the container.

In this brief resting position, Reis heard the latter bit of the small 'conversation' that had begun - the sole male student's claim of perfect henge, the third's corrected name - and nodded slightly; these were the correct Genin, or at least two of three, and that was good enough by his standard. With a final deep breath, to be certain he was fully prepared for the scope of what he was dropping himself into, Reis finally stepped about the stones and left the path, entering full view of the trio whether he'd been noticed before or not. "Good morning, you three."

Soku met Shigeo's glower with a glare far more impressive only due to her naturally wild look inherited from her father's side of her family rather than an answer to her ability to call him out on hiding. Pointed teeth even came to light as she smirked at his annoyance prior to his question and a fraction of a second before Kurisuna corrected him, her head whipped in the direction of the final genin portion of the team which had followed directly after a secondary sniff allowing the older female to behold the visual arrival in full and take in the look that was bestowed upon Shigeo and herself. Needless to say, her scowl returned and Chairomaru yipped loudly from his position in Soku's lap, at least until another scent wafted over the stones.

"He's-" Soku started only to be interrupted with the Jounin's introduction. "Here," she finished with a huff as Reis' greeting ended. Already in a foul mood before she had met the other members of the unit, Soku stayed seated upon the ground, wolfish eyes locked onto Reis as she petted Chairomaru. The latter had yet to take his own eyes off of Kurisuna. He yipped at her again.

SPOILER: Click to show

Skipping Shigeo since it's been awhile. Kurisuna can post now.

The frail male's expression soured further at the arrival of his second teammate: this Kurisuna, who was equally -- if not moreso -- arrogant as the Inuzuka before him. How he got saddled with such bigheaded incompetents, he would never know...perhaps the sensei at the Academy disliked him?

Before he could dwell on it much further, a fair-haired man of middling age stepped into view, greeting the three youths; Shigeo turned his gaze upon the male -- presumably, this was their new Jounin squad leader -- and gave a curt nod in reply. "You are?" he asked brusquely, his posture seemingly relaxed. However, should this stranger make any abrupt movements, he was prepared to cast a quick jutsu to defend himself...and only himself. Let these girls fend for themselves.