"This one has putrefied quite a bit faster than usual," Yakushi Kote said dispassionately, "so I'd put these on if I were you." The Chief Medic handed Tsunade and Jiraiya a couple of surgical masks. His own surgical mask hid his face almost completely up to his eyes, which were encased in combat goggles.

Tsunade's mouth tightened in annoyance. "I've seen worse, Kote." She folded her arms around her ample chest. "As you know."

"Should I have offered it to just him?"

Jiraiya could see Tsunade struggling not to smirk. "I guess not."

Jiraiya tossed the surgical mask aside. "I'm right here, you guys."

Kote turned to him and regarded him silently with his blank mask. The implied criticism annoyed Jiraiya to no end. In this day and age where henge jutsu were commonplace and every hidden village had a comprehensive bingo book and intel specialist clans like the Yamanaka, masks were increasingly becoming affectation rather than necessity. Yet people like Hatake or Yakushi here still felt like they were somehow superior to him. I am an S-class nin in four bingo books and a six-year ANBU veteran. How many people can say that, especially the latter? Jiraiya had to remind himself that, as Konoha's Chief Medical Officer, Kote was probably no slouch either.

In any case, the Chief Medic was right. It had been barely a day, and the sweet smell of decay hung so heavy in the examination room that Jiraiya could almost taste it. He fought an urge to gag at the last thought, and wondered if he should have swallowed his ego and put the mask on.

"I've already examined the body myself, so feel free to dissect away." The body was set on a gurney at the center of the room, and to his credit Kote had had the decency to cover her up with a plain shroud. As Tsunade and Jiraiya slapped on latex gloves in preparation, Kote moved to the other side of the gurney.

"What, no gloves for you?"

"Ha ha ha. Never heard that one before. Don't quit your day job." The mask was as featureless as ever, and the goggles just as impenetrable, but Jiraiya saw a twitch of irritation ripple underneath the white cloth of the mask.

Jiraiya had a sarcastic retort framed, but it stuck in his throat when Tsunade peeled the shroud from the woman's body. Suki. Her name is Suki. It was the first time Jiraiya had had a proper look at her. Early decomposition had bloated her face somewhat, but not so badly that Jiraiya could not see her sharp cheekbone and elfin features. Elsewhere she was slender and willowy. Only the cords of muscle on her arms hinted at the fact that Suki had once been a professional murderer.

With a jolt, Jiraiya recalled where he'd seen Suki before. He had seen her once or twice at the dumplings shop by the Hokage Monument. They had never spoken, however. Jiraiya realized with a pang of regret that he wanted to get to know this woman. How had they met? What had they liked about one another? All of a sudden Jiraiya found that he could not look at the body. Only decades of training and experience prevented him from throwing up right there. He gripped the edge of the gurney to steady himself, and forced himself to listen to the technical back-and-forth between Tsunade and Kote.

"So it was poison?" Tsunade said, running her finger down the side of Suki's body and peering at the clear slime that had collected.

"Oh, most definitely. There are no puncture wounds, and residue examination shows that the poison was administered through the ear."

"The ear? That strongly suggests that it was administered while she was asleep."

Kote nodded. "Indeed. And the poison is a volatile enzyme that breaks down within ten hours. I've managed to extract and analyzed some of the poison before it decayed, and well," Kote said, reaching up a hand to touch the bridge of his goggles, "I am extremely impressed. I have to have a larger sample to confirm, but I think the poison is activated and fed by chakra. And, um, sexual arousal."

Jiraiya was startled. "You're saying that I killed her?"

Tsunade's bark of laughter was abrupt and she contained it quickly. "Well hey," Tsunade turned to Jiraiya with barely suppressed bemusement, "you do know how to find it without a map. Good job."

He scowled at her. "Har har. Come on. Show some respect."

"Aww," Tsunade said in her best baby voice, "is this your first dead body, little genin?"

For a split second Jiraiya seriously considered bringing up Nawaki. But only for a split second. His friendship with Tsunade was worth more than that. As if she'd read his mind, Tsunade immediately looked more contrite. Not that she would ever apologise in so many words. But the princess was sorry, and that was good enough for Jiraiya.

She also had a point. It wasn't as though Jiraiya was some sort of innocent at this. He had killed hundreds of people – men or women, retirees or children, shinobi or civilian. He even had under his belt more than two dozen confirmed kills of shinobi who had once called themselves Konoha-nin. Nor was he a stranger to friends dying. No one becomes jounin without having a pile of dead comrades who were not quite good enough. Or lucky enough.

Kote coughed politely. "There is one more interesting thing I think you should see. On your side, the nape of the neck."

There were three small but definitely distinct dark blotches on the nape of Suki's neck, each about equidistant to one another. Tsunade drew in a deep breath, though whatever it was she and Kote saw eluded Jiraiya.

I prodded at the blotches. "Are these br-"

"No, they are not bruises," Kote said, in a tone that said it was the most obvious thing in the world. He sighed and continued. "See the perfect triangular pattern of the blotches? That's typical of chakra burns, we see it usually when treating Hyuuga practicing the Jyuuken, I've seen in on the Uchiha too, once or twice."

Jiraiya frowned. "So? We already know the poison has a weird relationship with chakra. This just confirms what we already know."

"But that's not the interesting part," Tsunade said. "Notice the flaring from the blotches. They are all clockwise."

Jiraiya drew in a deep breath and immediately regretted it. "Following so far, but so what?"

Tsunade began to speak again, but Kote cut her off. "Basically," he said with exaggerated slowness, "what all this amounts to is that this enclosed chakra loop acts like a seal that amplifies chakra exponentially."

"Well if the poison feeds on chakra, wouldn't that just kill you faster anyway?"

Kote shrugged. "That's my best guess on what happened to her. It's brilliant, really," he said, prodding the body absently with a pencil. "A miniscule amount with a miniscule effect that builds up slowly, imperceptibly… until it's too late."

A/N: So. Sorry I trolled you guys with the summary. This was super fun to write but it's also something I cranked out in maybe ten hours. So do tell me if any parts don't work, or any disparity from the canon. I've basically given up trying to set a proper time period to this. As of now it's probably set after Nawaki dies but before Dan appears in Tsunade's flashback. There's more to come, likely two more chapters to conclude.