"I've been in the area for a while. I think I might move on soon, though. It's starting to get crowded."

"Oh? We haven't seen anyone else while we've been here."

"Well, the Akatsuki, you know. It's pretty hard to spot an S-rank shinobi who doesn't want to be spotted."

Shit.

"I'm not sure I've heard of them." Though sneaky S-rank shinobi sounds unpleasant.

And plotful.

Double shit.

"No? Grumpy fellows, black cloaks with red clouds? One of them's your brother, I believe, Uchiha."

Why does the plot always have to happen to him. What did he do.

"Apparently I didn't need to know," he says, voice intentionally wry. "They have business here?"

He shrugs. "Either that, or they like the beach. I'd suggest you ask the other Konoha ninja who were here, but something tells me you don't need to know about that either."

He shrugs. "Thanks for the heads up."

A brief nod, then the stranger turns to Naruto.

"I'm curious how you come to be here."

"Like on this team?"

"On this team, in this place."

"I'm a shinobi of the Leaf, and they're my assigned team. They're also my friends. We had a mission that brought us out here."

"So, they gave you a team... and missions. I'm almost jealous."

"And your village didn't."

"And then I left. So it goes."

"It'd take a lot for me to leave the Leaf, but they're - better about some things, I think, and I can see how to improve the things they're bad at. And I've got close enough to family, there."

He smiles strangely.

"Try not to die, then."

"I usually do."

"That's a good habit. Well, maybe I'll see you around."

"Good luck," Naruto says, cheerfully.

He gives a lazy wave and starts walking to the mainland.

Once the guy's a distance away, to his team: "So, uh, S-rank criminals!"

"That's a little outside our mission brief," Neji says.

"And our abilities." And quite frankly 'Akatsuki is in the same area as Danzo's operatives' meeting area' is enough for him to have a pretty damn good suspicion of who Danzo is meeting with out here. Close enough for government work, and all that.

"Are we withdrawing?"