The last episode of NCIS found Rock Creek Park Sergeant Dawson chasing a vandal when her horse, Jasper, becomes spooked. As she investigates, she is stunned to find a man has been killed.
In the office, the team hand Tim their in-service training reports after having to take training courses in the span of three days. The reason is HR now made it his job to schedule the courses. Unfortunately, they still have to take a course involving being pepper-sprayed. Gibbs interrupts to tell them about the murder in the park.
The victim is identified as Gunnery Sergeant Remi Tanner, who was found with a large stone block crushing his head. Gibbs and Nick speak to Sergeant Dawson, whose police horse Jasper takes a liking to Gibbs due to the jerky in his pocket. After saying hello to another officer and his horse, the team tells Gibbs that there is evidence of two attackers and there was still cash in their victim’s wallet.
When Jasper begins nosing toward a hole in the stone structure, Gibbs and Tim walk over to see Sergeant Dawson found a burlap sack with blood on it. After photographing the evidence, Tim tugs it out and they are shocked to find animal skulls inside.
The animal skulls belong to a monkey from the African region where their victim had ties to Africa. He had spent months in Liberia teaching non-lethal raid tactics to wildlife rangers to help in stopping poachers. Nick wonders if the skulls belonged to the victim and Tim mentions bone collecting is valuable in some places (thanks to knowledge from his time with Abby.)
Tim tells Gibbs that the victim last spoke to Phoebe Spitz by phone, who is a friend of Abby’s. They are interrupted when Clayton tells Tim he has pepper sprays. They are not looking forward to being sprayed.
Abby tells Ellie and Alex about the organization that she is a part of that allows veterans to help in taking care of wildlife. Phoebe Spitz is the founder and she had been trying to recruit Tanner to join. She tells them he would not have been the one to have those animal skulls and his death could have been revenge for the recent arrest of Ousmane Best, a poacher with smugglers all over.
Nick and Gibbs go to see Sergeant Dawson, who is watching the police horses train. She is willing to look through crime reports to see if there were any other suspicious activities in the park. She gets a call on her radio about activity in the park near the crime scene from Officer Cole. They rush over to see a man handcuffed to a bench who is clearly high. He was left alone when Officer Cole went to chase someone.
They hear gunshots and rush to find Cole has been shot. Gibbs then sees his horse, Jody, also has an injury. Later, Nick lets the girls know that both Cole and the horse were being treated for their gun shot wounds. He sees that they went through being sprayed before Clayton tells them the Liberia ambassador has been trying to get in contact with Director Vance.
The original man Cole was arresting, Nelson, tells Gibbs and Tim that Jody, the horse, got spooked by something in the bushes and that was why the Officer had left. He tells them that he didn’t see the person, only someone’s shadow.
Ambassador Gabriel Moore comes to see Vance and appears to have knowledge about the case that has not been reported. He is also angry about not being told about the murder directly, confusing Vance in the process. He is cryptic as he tells Vance he wants to be informed of developments in the case.
Dawson arrives to aid Gibbs in a joint investigation. She also gives him and Alex a piece of tooth or ivory that was found in Jody’s mouth. They go to see Abby, who tells them there is no evidence in Tanner’s car for why he was in the park. She then tells them the bag with the skulls in it was in an area that was recently sprayed with a poison to kill tree-eating beetles in a forest area near Alexandria. There was only one spot that was sprayed so they go to investigate.
Heading to the ranger shack, Dawson learns Jody is not eating since he is not used to being cared for by anyone other than Cole, who only just got out of surgery. Dawson and Gibbs head to the ranger shack where they find animal carcasses inside.
Ducky informs Gibbs about bushmeat being sold all over before Ellie tells them she found photos from Tanner’s cloud server. He had discovered two individuals with the bags full of what appeared to be the bushmeat and animal skulls. He was hiding to photograph the suspects but was discovered before he was killed, proving he was actually not involved in the smuggling.
Vance gives his findings to Moore, who apologizes for his previous behavior. They talk about the perils of bushmeat and the struggle for survival in poor countries such as Africa. He offers his assistance and Vance has an idea.
Clayton learns he is being sent undercover to see who is selling the bushmeat in the hopes of finding the killers. They are interrupted with the news that Officer Cole died from internal bleeding. Tim asks Gibbs if he heard before being told to find the meat.
In the market, Clayton and Moore try to find bushmeat but no one is talking. When a vendor recognizes Moore, they talk him down before they notice a disturbance. It appears a woman had tried to steal from someone and when they arrive, Clayton finds Phoebe Spritz.
Clayton learns that Phoebe had been asking around about bushmeat in an effort to clear Tanner’s name. Ellie realizes Abby told her. The woman in question comes to let them know she did not realize Phoebe would take matters into her own hands and she tells Gibbs and Ellie the bushmeat came from a district in Liberia. That particular district just got an Ebola outbreak, meaning they need to stop the next shipment before it comes into the U.S.
Gibbs goes to see Jody, having given Dawson Cole’s riding boots to help Jody grieve his loss. When she asks him about how he knows horses so well, he tells her about his daughter Kelly and how she helped a neighbor’s horse move on after the man’s wife died.
Tim and Ellie work on coordinating with other agencies to hopefully prevent bushmeat from being brought into the country. They show Gibbs surveillance photos of known smugglers and he notices one man talking to Ousmane Best, the poacher in jail. They see other photos from Tanner of the guy with dreadlocks and it turns out to be Nelson, their stoner from earlier.
Abby tells Gibbs that while he had stopped dealing drugs, it now looked like he was involved in bushmeat smuggling. Nick comes to talk to Abby and Gibbs, where they inform Gibbs that Tanner had gone to a pawn shop the night he died and spotted Nelson. He recognized him from the months he spent looking at poacher files and followed him to the park. Alex tells them she has a lead on the accomplice thanks to the ivory in Jody’s mouth.
The ivory came from an earring the killer was wearing after Jody bit him. It turned out to be one of the vendors who claimed he hurt himself with a knife. The team carefully takes down Nelson and his accomplice without anyone in the market being hurt.
Vance and Moore discuss the successful takedown before the former invites Moore to speak at the press conference so the people in Libera could see he was committed to being their voice.
In the office, the team gazes at a photo of a newborn foal who was named in honor of Officer Cole. Nick is crying too, but he blames it on pepper spray. Tim then comes and brings the bad news that he had gotten the wrong information on the pepper spray course and they didn’t need it for another year. He backs away as his team advances on him with pepper spray, despite his pleas.
Dawson is with Jasper when she notices Jody is eating. Delighted to see this, she spots Gibbs sitting on the floor eating a carrot. He informs her Jody just needed a friend and she tells him that Jody could use a ride. Gibbs goes riding with Dawson and Jasper.