NCIS begins with a man driving down a road at night trying to find his destination through warehouses when he is shot through the window of his car. The next day, Tony and Ellie come in talking about Top Gun, which Ellie had not seen, leaving Tony surprised. They begin talking about Frozen, which they have all seen.
Gibbs comes in and Tim mentions his new Smartphone being ready. Apparently, Tim talked his boss into trying one for a little while. Gibbs tells them they have a case and Tim suggests they ride together to do a tutorial on the new phone as Tony asks Ellie about a scene. She is surprised about the information, considering she didn’t watch the entire movie.
Lieutenant Cody Oaks introduces himself to Tony thinking he is Gibbs and tells the agent that the victim is Leland Spears and his identification was flagged to notify ‘NIS’ if he was discovered arrested or deceased. Ellie and Tony are confused since the agency changed their name years ago. Tim and Gibbs finally arrive after the navigation system on Gibbs’ new Smartphone messed up, resulting in Gibbs destroying it. They tell Gibbs who the victim is and he is surprised. He asks about a birth date and they are confused about how he knows that. Gibbs reveals he is Leland Spears.
Gibbs tells the team that Director Morrow had formed an undercover unit back during the NIS days and that he was given that identity for dozens of cases. Tim thinks it’s possible cyber hackers got a hold of the identification. Gibbs sends Ellie and Tim to the victim’s apartment while Tony goes to see how Abby is doing on evidence.
Tony goes to see Abby, who is wearing old NIS coveralls that belonged to her predecessor. She tells Tony that the victim was talking on a burn phone to someone else who had a burn phone, but that there was a GPS tracking device discovered.
Ducky talks to the deceased’s body, telling him he is at least glad it wasn’t his predecessor on the table. Gibbs comes in and Ducky asks if he misses being undercover and he tells his friend about not losing his focus on what mattered and they bring up the time he went to Prague with former director Jenny Shepard. Ducky also tells him that there are no fingerprints on file for the victim.
At Spears’ home, Tim tells Ellie about Tony going undercover as Tony DiNardo, including when he fell in love. They find an ID lanyard that gave their victim security access to some place. After hearing a noise outside, they open the door and see Leland’s neighbor. He tells them that Leland was always home and that he didn’t seem to be working a lot.
Abby tells Gibbs that the bullets recovered from the victim didn’t come from any weapons on file. She was able to find information from the GPS tracker on the victim’s car that he went to a deserted area and when they pull up the satellite image of the area, Gibbs spots what appears to be a cabin. He says he will send Ellie and Tim out there then asks Abby if she has Tim’s number.
Ellie asks Tim if their boss would pull her undercover since she’s married, but he tells her that he doesn’t try to figure out what Gibbs will ask for. They are getting closer to the cabin and she is still asking about hypothetical undercover scenarios when the cabin explodes just before they reach it.
Tony arrives at the scene in time to hear Tim tell Ellie they would have been dead had they arrived any sooner and she retorts it was a good thing she had them stop for coffee. Gibbs finds evidence that Leland had used the cabin for a period of time based on a newspaper from last year. Tony finds what appears to be a computer that was hidden between the couch cushions and Gibbs shows Tim part of the trigger for the bomb.
Gibbs meets with former director Tom Morrow, who reveals to his old friend and co-worker that he actually was given the Spears identity by a woman named Michelle Stark, who was known as the Spook for coming up with identities for the CIA. She had given Morrow the Spears names as well as other ones and had retired from the job.
Abby tells Tim that the trigger was a parking timer that had once been used for parking meters but had been used by terrorists when setting up bombs. She was able to find that the accelerant used was some type of kerosene and she tells Tim she feels like she is channeling her predecessor. Abby also tells him that he had investigated a fire on a naval ship, which Tim remembers from stories his father told.
Gibbs and Ellie go to talk to Michelle Stark, who is now taking care of cats. They ask her about having worked for the CIA and when she hears the name Leland Spears, she remembers Gibbs’ face from when she made the identifications. She informs them the ID should have been unable to be retrieved since they were storied in CIA files.
Abby and Tim overhear Tony on the phone with his girlfriend, Zoe, and lying about working the next two nights. He tells them that her parents are in town and he’s not ready to meet them. They tease him about not wanting to go to dinner with the parents and remind him that he did so with Jean Benoit. However, he reminds them that he was doing that as an undercover assignment and then he tells Abby since she hasn’t met her boyfriend’s parents, not to judge him.
Abby asks for Gibbs and they tell Tony that the victim was getting information on something called Gallium Nitride, something used in aerospace and is a source of military use that should not be given to the wrong hands.
Gibbs and Morrow go to the squad room after finding out about the Nitride connection and when Tony and Ellie come to tell Gibbs about its uses, he ends up giving them information. He tells them that he once researched a case involving Gallium Nitride and Morrow says that someone intentionally stole his identity. Gibbs says they need to call the Secretary of Defense. After Morrow leaves, Tony and Ellie ask what he worked as undercover and are stunned when he tells them he was a computer technician.
Abby and Tim are talking about Gibbs being a computer technician undercover and they wonder if he secretly has known about computers the whole time. Tim isn’t too sure and Gibbs comes in to tell him that he never broke his cover. Gibbs finds out from them that their victim used his background while working for a company called Longview Technics, which worked with Gallium Nitride.
Gibbs deduces that the man worked with computers in order to steal information. They figure they will need to send someone in undercover to get the information that their victim was taking and Tim and Gibbs think Tim should go, but Abby tells them it will be easier to send Gibbs back in.
Later that night, Gibbs goes undercover to the building, but his badge isn’t working, so he talks to the security guard. Tim tries to give him information through a head piece, but Gibbs ignores him as he gets the security guard to let him in to the elevator. He gets to the office and finds a computer to use, where he asks Tim for help. Tim comments that he didn’t need his help earlier and Gibbs tells him he needs help for computers. Abby is sure they will have no problem helping Gibbs through the assignment, until he asks for the location of the Caps key. Four hours later, Gibbs walks past the security guard from earlier.
In the office, Ellie, Tony, and Tim look through the information that confirms Spears’ had stolen data. Tim finds that Spears’ had transferred documents to a second party and they find a location to a home that appears abandoned, until Gibbs locates a dead body. When they tell him the deceased’s name is Edgar, Gibbs asks if it was “Edgar Bron,” which turns out to be the alias Mike Franks used.
Back at the squad room, the team tells Gibbs they got no hits on Bron’s real name and that his home didn’t look lived in. They go through photos of Spears’ apartment and Gibbs notices the tattoo magazines. He tells them that it’s weird since the victim didn’t have tattoos and he asks Ellie for her Bluestar Kit and for them to find information on someone named Miranda Fleming, much to their confusion.
Gibbs goes down to see Ducky and asks to see Spears. He gets a black light and finds ultraviolet tattoos that are linked to Serbia.
Up in the interview room with Stark and Morrow, Gibbs talks to her about Franks identity, which had been a bartender. Tim comes in with information on Miranda Fleming and that she is alive. Morrow says they can pick her up once they mention she has a flight booked. But Gibbs shows him a photo showing none other than Michelle Stark.
Morrow and Gibbs interview Stark, who tells them that someone had come to them looking for backstopped IDs and she had only dealt with the handler for the two men who are now deceased. She agrees to call them when Gibbs tells her to contact them with the information that Edgar Bron survived.
The team is undercover in the hospital with Tim acting as a patient. A fire alarm causes Tony and Gibbs to go off while Ellie stays with Tim. She sees a doctor try to inject something into him and it turns out to be Spears’ neighbor, Hale. He runs off seeing their guns only to be stopped and arrested thanks to Gibbs and Tony.
Tim and Tony tell Morrow that Hale freely admitted that he had been about to inject Tim with potassium chloride, which would have given him a heart attack. He claimed to have diplomatic immunity, which Gibbs is checking on, and that he had moved in next door to Spears to keep an eye on him. Gibbs comes back to tell them that Hale lied about immunity so Morrow goes to talk to him.
In the squad room, the team gets ready to say good night and Tony says something about his favorite movie showing at midnight and Tim agrees. Ellie says no since she didn’t like the first half of it. When they leave, she asks Gibbs if he would ever send her on an undercover assignment and she says she accepts the big picture. He tells her to forget that and to go home to Jake when she asks if he thinks his time undercover caused difficulties in his marriage.
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