NCIS began with an unidentified person dragging a tarp on some dirt and leaves before a body is left in the woods. We see he is wearing a class ring before some time later, a young man beckons police to the spot where he found the body.
Ellie and her husband, Jake, arrive at the office and tell McGee and Tim about taking couples classes together, which they are finding to be boring, so they decided to take a break. They begin to tell them about an idea they have, but Tony tries to ignore them until Tim asks them what the idea is.
They mention wanting to invite them to dinner since Jake doesn’t know them very well and she also wants to invite Gibbs. However, the two agents don’t think he’ll come, but of course, Gibbs comes to tell them he already has and they agree to be there too. Ellie doesn’t have time to change out of her yoga clothes before Gibbs mentions the case so she says she will change while they are on their way, surprising her husband.
Tim identifies the victim as Lieutenant John Wallis, who is only 19. Ducky arrives to examine the body and he is alone since Jimmy is on paternity leave. He discovers that there is no blood under the victim and considering all of his wounds, they figure he was dumped in the woods. Gibbs notices a blood trail just as Ducky reads the writing on the victim’s ring. Tony recognizes it as the motto of his last prep school, Remington Military Academy. He notices the victim has something in his hand and it is a photo covered in blood.
Ellie and Tony follow the blood trail up to the spot where they figure the body was dragged to the spot where he was found. She tries to ask Tony about life in military school since she has a different picture of him in her head. However, Tony doesn’t respond since he finds a piece of a blue tarp that could have been used to drag the body while Ellie discovers tire tracks on the ground.
Ducky is talking to Wallis’ body in autopsy when Gibbs comes in. He informs Gibbs the victim was stabbed 20 times and that two wounds have distinctive marks. The victim also had a wound on his neck that punctured his carotid artery and Ducky figures since the victim didn’t have defensive wounds, someone he knew was his killer.
Tony and Ellie tell Gibbs that Wallis was the top of his class in both Remington and the Marine Corps when he joined. However, five days earlier, he received a phone call and disappeared after emptying his bank account. The call traced back to Remington and Gibbs tells them to go down there. Tony goes to talk to Gibbs, not wanting to go and telling Gibbs he has to “prepare psychologically.” Gibbs reminds him that it’s a six hour drive and one night staying at a hotel so he has plenty of time.
Tim goes down to see Abby, who hasn’t found anything from ashes found at the crime scene or anything about the stabbing. He tells her he wanted to see if she needed help and she asks him to dab the blood off the photo with her. Tim mentions that he could possibly skip something the next night and then feels bad when he tells Abby about the dinner since she wasn’t invited. Abby tells him it’s okay since she hangs out with them, along with her boyfriend Burt, all the time. Tim hopes it wasn’t couples massage and Abby reminds him to work.
Ellie is in the car with Tony when they get a message with the photo Abby cleaned up. It’s a photo of a young woman with a Remington uniform on. Ellie asks Tony if he is nervous about seeing his school again, but he claims it takes more than that to cause nerves. As they drive into the school, we get a flashback of a young Tony DiNozzo going to the military academy for the first time. Mr. Tanner takes him to his room and also tries to use a movie reference, but Tony doesn’t know what he’s talking about.
When they arrive, Gerald Tanner is happy to see Tony and tells Ellie that he thought Tony would make him proud. Tony tells him they are there about John Wallis and Ellie shows him the photo. Gerald tells them the girl is Christine Sanders and that she is dead.
Gerald tells them about Christine being a great student and heading toward being Valedictorian. When he tells them Tony was on the dean’s list too, Ellie is surprised. Tony gets them back onto the subject of Christine. She apparently had become depressed and overdosed ten days earlier. Gerald wonders if they think the death is connected and Tony tells him someone called John from her dorm after she died.
Abby is trying to match different knives to the wounds on Wallis, but she isn’t having luck. Gibbs has arrived by this point and they try to figure out John’s movements. They can’t do it since his phone was turned off and Gibbs tries to suggest turning on some memory thing, much to Abby’s amusement. However, she thinks she might be able to remotely turn the phone back on depending on what type of phone he had. Tim comes in to tell them that he got information from a Telecard company that Cadet Lucas Craig was the one who called John. Abby is able to turn John’s phone on and it belongs to a man named Frederick Cantor.
Ellie and Tony ask about Lucas Craig, who is a top ranking cadet. As Tanner continues to praise Tony, Ellie texts on her phone to Tim, much to Tony’s annoyance. Tony is still reserved around Tanner, even though the man wants to catch up. They are waiting for Craig to finish drills so they can talk to him as Ellie finds a photo of Tony as a flag bearer. Tony looks outside and we get another flashback of his time as a cadet when he defends a student.
Tony and Ellie talk to Craig, who tells them he had called John to tell him Christine died since they were dating. John had said he was going to go somewhere since he was devastated and he never came back to campus. Tony notices someone by a pickup truck has been watching them. Before Craig leaves, he salutes Tony, who reluctantly salutes back.
Gibbs goes to talk to Cantor, who reveals he went to Remington and was John’s mentor. He said John was distraught when he died and that his family wasn’t around so he wouldn’t have gone to them afterwards.
Tony asks Ellie not to tell Tim about everything at the school, but she’s confused since he was seen as being a good cadet. Tony isn’t forthcoming on his issues and they receive a phone call from a man who has information on Wallis’ death, but they need to meet at a hardware store by Remington. They have already gotten to DC though but agree to meet.
Gibbs and Jake get the call from Tony and Ellie, respectively, so they know they won’t be coming to dinner. Tim comes in the diner but when he sees they are alone, he rushes off just before Gibbs asks Jake for information on relations between Palestine and Russia.
Tony and Ellie wait for the man who called them and a man in a pickup truck pulls up. He tells them to get in because “it’s not safe.” Tony recognizes him as “Piggy,” the young man he had defended years earlier. He was also his roommate, Travis.
They go down to Travis’ house and he appears to be very nervous. They ask him for the information he has and he informs them that Christine was pushed to suicide because of Honor Corps. A flashback shows Tony playing basketball when a group of young men from the Honor Corps come in and accuse him of violating rules before they seem to threaten to harm him. However, Tanner comes in and prevents anything from happening before telling Tony he is on the basketball team.
Tony thought Honor Corps was eliminated, but it turns out it was happening quietly and he finds out Travis was always getting bullied. They find out Honor Corps had spent a month breaking Christine before she passed away and Wallis had come to Travis’ house looking for answers and he had gone back to the campus since he knew who did it. Tony apologizes for not knowing what happened to Travis.
Tim talks to Ellie the next day to let him know he found out Wallis had always been a good student and never got into trouble. She asks him how dinner went, but he tells her he left and doesn’t know how dinner went. Ellie has been trying to reach Jake, so she hangs up to call him and then Tim hears wolf-whistling. He finds Jake’s phone on Gibbs’ desk, leaving them both surprised.
Tim hangs up with Ellie when he realizes Gibbs is behind him. He has a police report Christine filed because she had a stalker who followed her home and was in her bedroom. Ellie and Tony interrogate Lucas Craig, who tries to deny anything about Honor Corps until Tony finds an arm band to show it was still around. They deduce he used a made up reason for her to have broken code of conduct to make her pay for rejecting him. Lucas knows his actions made her kill herself and Wallis had come to fight him, but that Tanner put a stop to it.
Abby tells Gibbs and Tim she was unable to match recent tires to the one found at the scene of the crime, but then she thought about discontinued tires. The tread matched a tire used on European cars in the 1970s and she found a replica was made for a 1972 Citroen DS.
Tanner comes to see Ellie and Tony, as he got an angry phone call from Craig’s father. Tony is stern as he tells the man to open his trunk. Ellie sprays it with luminol and they find evidence of a large pool of blood.
Tony watches Gerald in the interview room as he remembers a time when he tried to hot wire Tanner’s car to leave. However, Tanner found him and told him that he was a good cadet and that he would keep an eye out for him. He had told Tony not to run. In the present, Gibbs asks Tony if he wants Gibbs to do the interview, but Tony says he will.
Tony goes inside to talk to Tanner, who tells him he didn’t have anything to do with the murder. He tells Tony he had stopped Wallis from touching Craig and talked him down, but Wallis was ready to expose Honor Corps. Tanner tries to tell Tony they had good turn outs from a few bad ones and it wasn’t easy to get rid of Honor Corps. Tony tells him they were just kids and that he left RMA behind. Tanner tells him he barely drives his car and everyone knows where his keys are kept inside.
Abby goes over the car and tells Gibbs and Tim that Wallis’ DNA was found on the steering wheel and the killer had driven it back. She also mentions that she found wax used in carpentry and Gibbs gets an idea before asking for the bus station surveillance footage they had seen earlier that had confirmed Wallis went back to the school. He wants to see what happened after his death.
Gibbs goes to talk to Cantor, who is trying to clean up one of his tools. Gibbs knows it’s most likely Wallis’ blood. Cantor had killed Wallis because if he exposed RMA, he would have caused Cantor to loose what he had most and that Wallis didn’t understand the motto of “Truth, Valor, Duty.” Gibbs balks, telling him that Cantor was the one who betrayed Wallis.
Tanner is being led out of the squad room when Tony comes in. He tells Tony he is going to resign from RMA. He tells Tony he is still proud of him. Tony is quiet as he walks over to his desk and Ellie hands him a photo from his flag bearer days. Tony has trouble with the past, but ends up keeping the photo as Jake comes in to get Ellie. He is very quiet about what happened at the diner the night before, much to Ellie’s chagrin. After they leave, Tony calls Travis to see about catching up over dinner.
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