//A:N// Note to self: I want to change the current cover....what should it be? Please remind me to remove this note once the new cover is made.

Edward stood calmly amidst the group of the fallen, his head facing downwards and eyes closed. During the long stretch of time that had passed he had made a near complete recovery, his face now unmarred by burns, blisters, or the bandages. He turned towards the trees and smiled in an almost sane way.

"It's safe now." He called in a surprisingly soothing way. Over the months, he and Naruto had bonded and Edward had-while not regaining sanity-managed to restore his psyche enough so that he was a much more functioning person while Naruto seemed to loose this ability of restraint, relying on Edward to control him.
Nightingale explained to Naruto that Edward had lived his life protecting either Ditsy or Alphonse, first Ditsy and then Al when the three kitsu had been separated. Edward had all but been raised to protect, finding a new sibling giving him a reason to gather his mind into one area rather than leaving it in a spectrum of madness.
Naruto poked his head from the bush, being of the most easily recognizable due to his whiskers and having to be hidden until things calmed down politically, and bounded over to Edward.

"We can take their cloths and supplies and use their meat as food." Edward said as he poked one of them with his foot.

"Can we save their bones?" Naruto asked childishly
"More specifically their ribs and skulls?" He continued as he grabbed the head of one of them, a woman, and moved his thumb across her jaw line, imagining the curve of the white material.

"If you want to, I guess." Edward responded, glancing around and looking beyond the trees, before looking off towards the small town in the distance.

"When did they say they'd get back?" Edward asked. He felt a soft tug as the knife he was holding was taken. He glanced over to Naruto to see the boy eyeing the back of the woman's neck, her hair lifted by one of Naruto's hands and the other  holding the knife as he poked it to her skin.

"I think around sunset, why?" Naruto asked, jabbing the dirtied weapon into her spinal cord and wiggling it.

"Just curious." He answered. Nightingale had gone into town to try and pry information from the people in the form of gossip, Ditsy having gone with to get new cloths as he old ones had been ruined when she was practicing with acidic bubbles, her newest game. Kurama was busy rebuilding their old home, which was a dimension linked to her mind.
Edward watched Naruto fail at beheading the woman for a minute more, amused, before walking over and gently taking the knife away from his sibling.
"Here" he said, the blade suddenly cackling with energy as it grew slightly longer. The moment it seized its growth, Edward made a swinging motion. The blade had increased in sharpness, enough so that it was able to sever the tissue.
Due to the fact that Naruto had been holding the head up by her hair, his arm swung at the sudden lack of resistance and flung the head high into the air.

"Whoops" Naruto said sheepishly. Edward rolled his eyes and made a shooing motion.

"Just go get it." Edward said simply, licking the blood from his hand and the knife as the younger demon sped off before anyone else would have a chance to see it.
When Naruto returned, he helped Edward remove all of the valuables from the remaining, sorting through the things, and then helped him drag the corpses back to their camp. Once there, after all of the valuables were placed in a separate area so as to not get dirty or lost, the pair began to strip the first before moving to remove the skin.

"What's the point of doing this?" Naruto asked in an annoyed voice.

"We're flaying them so we can remove the muscles better." Edward responded

"Can we make anything from the skin?" Naruto asked in an annoyed tone.

"We can but it might be tricky" Edward responded as he ran the pealed down the deceased woman's stomach. Naruto didn't understand why Edward had insisted on keeping her undergarments on, no point to it really. Once the skin was removed, Edward began to show Naruto how he liked to remove the muscle. Edward made a scalpel form and handed Naruto the small blade, but signaled him to wait.
Edward formed his own scalpel and set it down.
"I want a table." Edward stated blankly, Naruto raised an eyebrow

"You're stopping me because you want a table?" He asked in a deadpanned tone.

"I stopped you because we need to wash our hands." Edward corrected
"But I do want a table." He continued

"Why?" Naruto asked as he and Edward stood back up.
"And can't you just form one with that special stuff you always do?" He asked

"But then it wouldn't be special!" Edward exclaimed back. He clapped his hands and the blood on his arms disappeared.
"And it's not an endless supply, I need to restock first." He continued. Edward formed two pairs of rubber gloves and handed one pair to his sibling.

"You want to restock? Here-" Naruto pushed his arms outwards, gesturing to the blood that coated them.
"-take this before it dries." Edward rolled his eyes but clapped his hands, touching his sibling's upper arm. Edward took his scalpel again and began working, removing the meat by muscle groups, beginning by one of the shoulders.

"See, if I had a table-" Edward placed the chunk in a white porcelain bowl that appeared near them
"I'd be able to do this in a much cleaner fashion, and we could both do it at both sides without bumping into each other." He continued. Edward put the remaining portion of the deltoid into the bowl before moving to the other side.

"Oh!" Edward's knife slipped through the trees major on accident, slicing it roughly in half, at the outburst.
"And, if you had a table, we could have a room for it!" Naruto continued excitedly.
"One that's soundproof!" He continued

"Why would we want that?" Edward asked
"No point if they're already dead." He continued. Edward moved to the triceps, slicing off the muscle group whole and offering it to his sibling.

"No thanks, and they wouldn't be dead." Naruto continued. Edward gave him an odd look
"Remember when you guys kid napped me?" He tried

"Yeah..." Edward replied, unsure where this was going.

"You tortured Zabuza and, while it looked horrifying at the time, I think it might be fun." Naruto looked up hopefully to the elder, whose face fell at the expression.

"Fine" he responded finally, but before Naruto could give his adorable cheer of excitement, Edward continued.
"But not until after our new home is restored." Naruto agreed with these boundaries and quickly helped remove the rest of the remaining meat from the beheaded person, the five others being piled up in another corner.

"Ewwww" Ditsy complained when they got to the camp sight, nose curled in disgust and both of her eyes roughly focusing on the deceased man.
"He soiled himself" she finalized in a complaint. The man in question still bore his clothing, though he had been robbed of all of his belongings.

"Yeah, corpses tend to do that." Nightingale responded dryly and with a sly grin. Ditsy gave a huff before turning to her other siblings.

"You guys've sure been busy." She noted, walking around the pile of corpses as if they were nothing but fertilizer. Edward gave a laugh at this and offered her a bowl of red stringy meat.

"Want some?" He asked, Ditsy swiftly grabbing a chunk that had been of the gracilis.

"Needs seasoning" Ditsy mumbled as she chewed the wad of flesh, she swallowed as gave a pleased sigh.
"But it is an amazing cut." She added.

"Why thank you" Edward responded, puffing his chest out slightly and grinning.

"So, what's the word on the Leaf?" Naruto asked curiously.

"It's in bad condition" Nightingale began, setting down the clothes she and Ditsy had acquired during their visit.
"Apparently, the Leaf had been working on a treaty with the Sand but, after the riots and stuff, the Sand pulled out.
The hokage was described as 'corrupted' because he's stopped sending ninja out of the village for mission, they're going bankrupt." She took a large chunk of rectus abdominus and bit into it, her sharp teeth biting into it easily. She smirked as she swallowed the flesh before looking to Naruto.
"How're you feeling?" She asked him, smirk remaining but dimming into kindness.

"Honestly? Confused." Naruto asked, brow furrowing as he thought. Ditsy sat down at the picnic tables bench, the others doing the same.
"My life hadn't made that man changes up until that first real mission" he said, looking upwards and at each member of his new family.
"I mean, it had sucked, a lot, but then things went from bad to worse and then better so fast." Naruto touched his chin, thoughtful.
"It was like my life had been moving in a direction, I was moving to acquire a steady goal and it felt that my life had been going somewhere-" Naruto shook his head and made a showing motion with one hand, leaning on the table with his other.
"And then it all went out the window, like-" Naruto was interrupted by the surprisingly sly voice of his elder sister.

"Like someone through a wrench in the system?" Nightingale asked

"Yeah, exactly like that." Naruto responded, it hadn't been what he was about to say but it completed the sentence.

"Well, you see Naru, dimensions, or timelines, and most of them have similar-what we call-storylines." She began
"Each dimension is slightly different than all others, but most all of them have keen similarities, this was just one of them that have your world in it." She continued
"One of these keen similarities I've already seen here-"

"Were you stalking me?" Naruto squeaked in surprise.

"I know, right?" Nightingale laughed at his expression.
"Anyways, when we interviewed in your life is when the flow of your timeline stopped. Unlike other dimensions, we were there. There are different versions of us sprinkled throughout the multiverse but we're inter-dimensional, if we go into another dimension then no other dimension will copy our actions." Naruto didn't understand how this explained his question, but he didn't interrupt and voice his thoughts.
Edward scratched at the scarf of bandages that were tied around his neck, giving an adorable yawn. Nightingale blinked and turned towards Edward before moving back to Naruto.

"Alright, that's enough for now." She concluded. Edward stood up, stretching.

"See you guys in the morning." He told them before walking off and into the tent. It wasn't very long before he was joined by his siblings, Ditsy now in a new outfit.

"Goodnight" Edward mumbled quietly, already partially asleep.

"Night." Naruto replied, snuggling into the large tail he had decided to use as a pillow.

"Sweat dreams." Ditsy told, snuggling into the side of her sleeping sibling. His wing was slightly over her but she didn't care, it was warm and she had missed the comfort from her youth.

"All of you shut up and go to sleep." Nightingale joked lightly, laying on the other side of Ditsy.

//A:N// hey guys! Things sure have been moving fast, haven't they? It's sad to say that most of the bonding didn't happen onscreen, but don't worry, you'll see plenty of fluff soon X3 also, for the sequel, it's been out since the second chap of this one and I hadn't decided to make them both coincide until a little while later so things are a little off, but most everything does smooth together in the ending I've been planning. Sorry if things have started to move in a bit more abrupt way rather than silk like but this is what I've planned, I made the beginning like most all other generic-though entertaining and lovely to read-Naruto stories up until the first mission.
They didn't confront Zabuza right away because they got there before Zabuza would have gone to intersect them, they got there before home because they hadn't been stopped by all of the chatter, nor did they stop for the off screen overnight thing. They spent a lot less time there because Kakashi hadn't had to teach Naruto how to walk vertically and thus could focus on Sasuke, so they spent a lot more of their off screen time guarding the bridge.
Because they spent more time guarding the bridge, the people building the bridge felt safer so fewer of them quit, and this made it so that they finished faster than they would have. Zabuza went to confront Naruto because he felt threatened and intrigued, and if he hadn't than the story would have returned to normal, heck, it would have followed its destined timeline if the others hadn't interfered and pushed things off track.
Haku attacked them because he knew his master went to speak with Naruto and was able to put two and two together, thinking that Kakashi had killed Zabuza. Sasuke, due to the extra narcissism granted to him by Kakashi and Sakura, didn't think it wrong to use Naruto for his benefit. Sasuke honestly didn't think it wrong, nor would he understand it if someone tried to explain it to him.
In the case that he would be confronted, he would defend himself. In the case that someone talked about it to Sakura, she would defend him to protect the identity she had given herself.
Saratobi used Naruto under the correct assumption that he could manipulate the boy to remain in the area, using the physical and psychological torment given to the boy to force the fox to heal her container. The energy that she gave him would be cleaned subconsciously by Naruto unless in a fit of rage due to the fact that it would be pushed out of him rather than absorbed.
The creatures inside of Naruto were never evil, most of them not even being born demons, they were made that way by Saratobi's henchmen and have no choice if they want to survive other than following Saratobi's lead since Saratobi used the time they were inside of Naruto to addict them to the energy, the same energy being mostly extracted during his time there.
Okay, that explains everything up to there, now who wants me to-likely restate-what's going on here?
Saratobi is a master manipulator but let his ego cloud his judgment, as seen by him assuming Naruto to be dead after the extraction and blabbering on about his plan rather than lying to him and giving him false comforts so that he could redo the process to enlarge his new army of weapons.
His entitlement lead to his downfall, and his original plan went to nothing as most of the creatures died upon extraction whilst he lost the opportunity to regrow his creatures. Not only that, but Naruto's new siblings-they weren't at the time but grew attached afterwards-broke him out, making it so that there was literally no chance of them succeeding in their plans.
I decided not to show this because, while it would be interesting, it isn't the main plot nor climax I have planned, isn't how I want to end the first book, and would take way too long.
Unfortunately, Naruto won't get to practice his new fascination in death until the second book-I went a bit crazy during that one...whoops-nor will he get the room he wants until at least the third book-already out!-but bear with me here.
I hope this explanation was helpful and I'll see you in the next chapter, now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go eat lunch.