NCIS: New Orleans was a touching episode that led us into the Christmas season. In this episode, a man named William Samuels is killed after a fight with a man named Len Bowers, who hadn’t meant to kill him after being confronted for being a naval imposter. As the case goes on, a jacket linked to Bowers ends up giving a family the hope of being reunited with a lost loved one.

During the course of the case, we discover that Chris, who usually goes all out for the holidays, is somber when it comes to Christmas. Addie Watkins, who comes to help with the case since she knew the victim, talks to Chris eventually and finds out some information about Chris’ personal life, something he has kept guarded from everyone except Pride.

This episode of NCIS: New Orleans was amazing because not only did it give us some more information on our beloved characters, but a sad case eventually led to an amazing twist. Let’s take a look at some of the information we learned and some of the best moments from the episode “Stolen Valor.”

Image courtesy of Jennifer Graylock/INFphoto.com

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10. Victim

The victim in this case is a retired SEAL named William Samuels who makes his living on exposing imposters who say they are in the armed services for financial means. At first, the team thinks he was simply stabbed to death, but then they realized he was impaled and that the attack occurred before he actually died.

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9. Fake out

In an effort to get Len Bowers’ girlfriend to talk, Brody tells a story about how her fiancé had left her after proposing and she knew deep down that he wasn’t the person she thought he was. This makes Trish Parker tell her where Len Bowers is going. Of course, Brody was most likely fudging the truth.

Image via Twitter from NCIS: New Orleans

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8. Strange behavior

When Brody sees LaSalle get off the phone with his mom, she asks him about Christmas plans. But she is surprised when he seems less than enthusiastic, especially because he goes crazy over the holidays.

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7. Chase

The team discovers the man who most likely killed William is a man named Len Bowers, who is in Bud’s files as an imposter. When they arrive at the apartment of the woman he’s with, Trish Parker, the couple leads them on a chase.

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6. Open book

The team gets help from Watkins, someone who has worked wit them before and has known Chris for two years. She isn’t sure about why he doesn’t like Christmas either and tells Brody he is not the open book he claims to be.

Image via Twitter from NCIS: New Orleans

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5. The jacket

The team finds a jacket in Len Bowers’ apartment and it turns out to have belonged to a missing, and presumed dead, explosives specialist named Zack Chase, who died almost a year earlier.

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4. Learn things

Pride and Chris talk about the case and how Chris has had similar experiences that the parents of Zack Chase did. He tells Pride he tried again to find his brother and it only hurt his parents. Pride wants to try and find out what they can and tells Chris to work on Zack Chase while he deals with finding Len Bowers.

Image via Twitter from NCIS: New Orleans

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3. He’s alive

After getting some intel that the jacket that belonged to Chase was found by a little boy in Afghanistan, Pride speaks with the boy via the video monitor. He finds out that a man named Taz gave it to him. Earlier, we found out Zack’s childhood nickname was Taz, a shortened version of Tasmanian Devil. Realizing that Zack was alive close to a month ago, Pride announces they are going to Afghanistan.

Image via Twitter from NCIS: New Orleans

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2. Opening up

Chris is talking to Watkins and he gives out some information about his brother. He suffered with bipolar disorder and he didn’t come to the holidays beginning four years earlier. Chris hadn’t been able to find him and it left him feeling off, especially since it was his job to find people. Later on, Chris figures out another way to find his brother.

Image via Facebook from NCIS: New Orleans

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1. Reunion

Hands down, the best part of this episode was seeing the parents reunite with their son, Zack, who they spent nine months mourning.