In Morocco a bomb explodes inside a nightclub while Ziva sings; in Washington, DC, Gibbs and his new gang investigate the death of a petty officer, Vargo, who died of a gunshot in his house trailer, without detection, four and a half months before. The team learn that a former buddy and shipmate, Roberts, died in the explosion in Morocco, and that Ziva sustained injuries; Gibbs speaks by telephone with Ziva, who says that Vance had tipped her about Roberts, who apparently was the target of the bomb. Vance tells Gibbs that an NCIS agent had blackmailed Vargo before he disappeared. After another shooting, Vance, Gibbs, and McGee reach a solution, and Ziva gladly returns to the NCIS. Written by DocRushing

A lieutenant appears to jump overboard from USS Seahawk (CVN-65) at sea; Tony, the agent afloat, reports to Gibbs, who sends McGee and Ziva to interview the wife or widow ashore; they find her body in her living room. Tony investigates in Cartagena, Colombia, where the officer supposedly joined the ship, and he finds the body; Tony tells Gibbs that the carrier has a security problem (the presence of the person who impersonated the lieutenant to board the ship). Gibbs and Ziva join Tony in Cartagena, then they all fly to the ship at sea; they continue to investigate; they find the answers and catch the bad guy. Tony returns to the home office with Gibbs and Ziva, and he stays. Written by DocRushing

Two cyclists find a body; the victim was a woman lieutenant commander assigned to the Navy Office of Legislative Affairs; Gibbs and company investigate. Ducky says that she died elsewhere from a single shot to the back. Gibbs, in response to a phone call, meets an old friend, who's a senator, who says that he was in an affair with the victim; McGee, acting on a tip, takes a tumble and finds a revolver. A computer-generated voice taunts the director, and Gibbs introduces the senator and the director to each other. Abby solves another malfeasance. Gibbs and Tony find a second body, with a printed suicide note; however, the team figure out what really happened, and they arrest the bad people. Written by DocRushing

A fight in an alley behind a bar leaves one Marine corporal dead and another critically ill; the gang investigate; Gibbs says that the event was an ambush, not a bar brawl. The survivor is from Gibbs's hometown; Gibbs and Ducky agree that the survivor may have been the target of the attack. McGee and Ziva go with Gibbs to the town, where they meet Gibbs's father and others; they learn that everyone in town believes that the Marine died four years ago. Flashbacks abound; Gibbs finds lies and liars. McGee and Ziva gather evidence, but it disappears, so Tony and Abby join them, and they get more evidence; then they all put the pieces together and nail the bad guys. Written by DocRushing

A neighbor finds the body of a tortured Marine lance corporal, hanging in his garage; Gibbs and company investigate. When Gibbs and Tony seek to question a recently retired Marine, they find Fornell inside the retiree's home; Fornell says that the Marine is the FBI's key witness in a murder trial; McGee finds that Fornell's defendant is one of the most notorious criminals on the East Coast. Another Marine dies after enduring torture. The retiree-witness leads Gibbs and Fornell on a chase, then they question him again. Abby finds crucial evidence against the gangster; Fornell, Gibbs, and the gang connect the dots, and a confrontation takes place on a sidewalk and closes the case. Written by DocRushing

A woman Marine in an outlying area of family housing aboard the Marine Corps Base, Quantico, Virginia, finds bloody water spraying from a shower head; Gibbs and company investigate; in a holding tank in the water-supply system, Ducky and others find both a body and the URL of a website, which yields clues. Palmer says that something is missing, and Duck says that it disappeared while the victim was still alive. Gibbs and Tony find a second body with a second URL and a personal greeting; a girl singer helps. The clues suggest more deaths. Gibbs receives a strange phone call; Ducky makes a psychologic profile on the unknown bad guy, and McGeek makes a significant discovery. A second man dies. Gibbs calls a suspect to his chat room, where the suspect runs into an unexpected problem and yields to it. The gang figure out the game, then they show up at the next site, where Gibbs realizes who the real bad guy is, so he and the others nab him. Written by DocRushing

Masked gunmen rob the Quantico Federal Credit Union, aboard the Marine Corps Base, and shoot a guard, Ray Vittorio, to death; Gibbs and company investigate. The director temporarily assigns to the Gibbs team a new recruit, who recently served at Quantico while on active duty. Abby says that all the loot burned with the getaway Suburban. The gang realize that the perps are pros, and they begin to question whether the robbery had some objective other than getting cash; then they make several connections, including Joey Vittorio, Ray's son, who has dropped out of sight. Suddenly the team attend the burial of Ray, where they, including the newbie, round up the bad guys. Written by DocRushing

A cadaver packed in dry ice inside a wooden crate arrives at a highly classified secure Navy facility; Gibbs and company receive a call, then start an investigation on-site; however, those events are a setup to enable the Gibbs gang to test the physical security of the facility. Further, that test is itself a ruse by which to identify and catch a mole within the NCIS. Gibbs, Tony, and Ziva meet the SecNav. The door to Abbyville causes problems. Vance calls a meeting in the evidence garage, and he sends Lee out on an errand. The team meet Lee outside; that leads to a session between Gibbs and Lee in his chat room. Gibbs says that he and Lee now work together. Written by DocRushing

Lee's daughter, Amanda, almost escapes. In an attempt to follow Lee's pickup man at the drop, Tony and McGee do a stakeout at a coffee shop, but it does not go well. To search for Lee's daughter, Tony and Ziva, with the guidance of McGee and others, go hiking in a woodland, and they find a decrepit old house with a secret room (where Amanda's kidnapper has kept her) plus the body of a dead man. Tony, Abby, and Gibbs show dislike and intolerance toward Lee. Amanda turns out to be not Lee's daughter but rather an adopted sister. The next day Gibbs himself does the stakeout on the inside of the shop, then the routine takes an unexpected turn, and the pickup man leads the gang down a different path. Vance accuses Gibbs and McGee of having committed treason. However, the team figure out everything, they get the bad guy, and the story reaches a sad end, during which Gibbs takes a round. Written by DocRushing

A dying boatswain's mate, 26, staggers into a woodland; Gibbs and company investigate. The victim has just become involved in a single-car crash; however, his car bears evidence of gunfire directed at the car, and his body bears injuries apparently from both a recent beating and previous ones. The gang visit the victim's home, where three members of the neighborhood watch provide some helpful information. Abby identifies a person of interest, who unexpectedly shows up at the bullpen, and who tells about the activities of an underground fight club. Abby then identifies a car of interest, so Gibbs chats with the owner and her husband-lawyer, who runs but goes to the home of the victim, where the gang find him dead. McGee discovers the business underlying the murders, and the team put all the pieces together. Written by DocRushing

A detective of the Metro PD approaches Gibbs on the day before Christmas Eve while investigating a burglary and double homicide involving an older couple in their upscale home. A delivery driver saw a third person inside the house; fingerprints at the scene lead to a former Navy hospital corpsman second-class (HM2), Quinn, who served in Vietnam with The Walking Dead, and who supposedly died 17 years before; Ducky signed the death certificate for Quinn. Abby sees Santa Claus and makes a picture of herself with him. Gibbs, acting on a suggestion by Ducky, finds Quinn at the The Wall; then the gang get a project for Christmas Day; Tony finds an unpleasant Christmas gift. The Metro cop rushes to nail Quinn, but the team believe otherwise, and they persist in their efforts; Gibbs, Tony, and Ziva meet the cop at the scene, and the real bad guy joins them, so they bust him. McGee gets a shock; Gibbs makes a delivery and a telephone call. Written by DocRushing

While videotaping in a forest, an actress accidentally falls into an open makeshift grave and finds the skeleton of a Navy lieutenant wearing dog tags and dress blues; the lieutenant lacks both middle fingers; Gibbs and company investigate; at the site the boss says that the victim died 11 years ago, and that he knows who killed him. The gang learn that the suspect is now imprisoned in Maryland for the murders of two sailors; Abby says that the same knife killed all three men. Gibbs sends McGee to get a confession for the third murder; while McGee questions the prisoner, other inmates create a disturbance, kill a guard, seize McGee, and take over the visitor center. At McGee's suggestion he serves as a negotiator; he gets a release of the other visitors, then he investigates the death; Gibbs and Ducky join McGee at the prison; Abby makes a curious discovery, and McGee gets a face full. With help, though, McGee works out the problems. Written by DocRushing

On a sidewalk in Washington, DC, a displeased former fiancée stabs to death a Navy boatswain's mate first-class; Gibbs and company investigate; they quickly find the assailant nearby. While the gang work on-site, a different woman shouts at Ducky in Dari (a.k.a. Farsi), and, grabbing and using the murder weapon, stabs him through one hand and escapes into the crowd of spectators. A translator says that the woman accused Ducky of having killed her brother; Ducky readily agrees that he did so; Abby identifies the woman as an Afghan immigrant, who has now obtained refuge in the Afghan embassy. Ducky surrenders at the Afghan embassy to face charges for an incident while Ducky served in Afghanistan 30 years ago in the Royal Army Medical Corps. Gibbs obtains and uses information obtained from a CIA operative. Conversations at the embassy result in the release of Ducky and the withdrawal of charges. Written by DocRushing

In a forest two kids find the disemboweled body of a missing Navy captain, who had worked in counterespionage at the Office of Naval Intelligence; Gibbs and company investigate. Ducky says that the death involved both blunt-force trauma and carbon monoxide, and that the disembowelment took place postmortem; he also finds a pentagram impressed into the back; he later suggests that the killer(s) looked for something inside the body. Tony and Ziva speak with a Cuban maid at the home of the victim, and Gibbs later does so in his chat room. McGee finds a connection between the victim and the US Department of Homeland Security, along with curious unexplained international journeys. Abby identifies a car at the scene, so Gibbs, McGee, Tony, and Ziva check it out, then a man falls to his death right in front of them. Ducky finds a ring and the explanation about it, then the gang put the pieces together, so Gibbs and Tony visit the bad guy and take him into custody. Written by DocRushing

Acting on a report of shots fired, the Metro PD finds the body of Marine Pfc. Emilio Salazar; Gibbs and company investigate. Salazar, 18, had grown up in the same neighborhood where he died; he enlisted four months ago, and he was scheduled for deployment next week; someone at the scene wrote Gibbs's Marine Corps service number in blood. Salazar had a criminal record since age 12; all his offenses were juvenile and gang-related; his body bore gang tattoos. Ducky says that Salazar died slowly after a single round to his chest, and that machine-gun fire strafed his body six hours postmortem. Gibbs calls Franks to Washington, DC, to help find someone; Franks says that Colombia was a long time ago. Gibbs and Franks chase the leads and question the sources; they feel puzzled, but they continue to fit the pieces together; finally they get the rest of the picture while speaking with a gentle, kindly former-Vista volunteer neighborhood social worker. Written by DocRushing

A man, while impersonating Tony, checks into a hotel, dumps down a trash chute a bag containing a body, then checks out; predictably, Gibbs and company investigate. Fortunately, Tony has a good alibi for the night in question. The victim was a Navy lieutenant; Ducky describes evidence of both strangulation and a knife wound to the heart. The impostor approaches Tony; he is the first person convicted as a result of Tony's investigative work after Gibbs went to Mexico on hiatus; the victim was the prosecution witness in that case; the impostor has recently become released from prison. The impostor also has an alternate explanation, and he asks Tony to consider certain evidence. Gibbs places Tony back in charge of his case, and Gibbs says that the impostor was innocent of the previous charge. After pursuing many clues, the team put together most of the pieces but not all of them. Written by DocRushing

Jack Patterson, a special agent of the NCIS, dies on a sidewalk in Washington, DC, in an execution-style shooting right after he drops a package into a mailbox. Abby says that Jack was on his way to meet her; soon she receives the carton from Jack, which contains a painting, which Abby finds to be radioactive. Gibbs interviews a man who introduces himself as an agent of the US Department of Homeland Security (DoHS). Abby learns that the slugs in Jack's body match a handgun used in an unsolved murder in Arizona two years ago; Gibbs and Tony go to Arizona and meet the artist. The real agent of the DoHS shows up in the squad bay; McGee alerts Gibbs, who, while on horseback with Tony, soon receives gunfire from a helo, and they return fire and crash the bird. Gibbs and Tony rescue the artist from harm, and they and the rest of the gang finish putting together the pieces of what happened. Written by DocRushing

Gibbs learns that Vance, the director, has begun working a case by borrowing some of the members and other resources of the Gibbs team; an ME in Chicago, Illinois, has shipped to Ducky for an autopsy the body of a boxer, which the Chicago PD had fished out of Lake Michigan. Vance, McGee, and Ziva are in Chicago; Vance says that a former member of the Marine Corps has disappeared, and that he will send a material witness to Washington, DC, under protection. Gibbs wonders whether Vance has overstepped his authority. To avoid talking about Vance's case, Gibbs and Abby communicate via sign language; Gibbs shows up at Vance's house, and Vance's wife informs Gibbs that he'll stay for dinner. Vance has profound conversations with Gibbs and with Joe Banks, a suspect from Chicago; Tony says that Joe is not the right one. Eventually Vance receives word from Chicago about what took place, then he goes again to Chicago and takes part in a memorial service. Written by DocRushing

In Navy family housing in Norfolk, Virginia, a mother finds a revolver among the personal stuff of her 12-year-old son, Noah; base authorities send the piece to the NCIS; Abby learns that the handgun was recently fired, and that the barrel bears human brain tissue; Gibbs and company investigate. Gibbs, Tony, McGee, and Ziva check the house and talk with Noah and two friends; the conversations lead to a search for a body; Tony, McGee, the boys, and their mothers find the right spot, and McGee finds maggots, a remnant of an ear, and tire tracks; not far away Tony spots the body of a local bully. Meanwhile Abby learns that the gun has been used in three crimes; the gang trace its history; later Abby says that there's another victim. Gibbs recognizes a familiar face; Tony and Ziva find the last body; Gibbs and McGee learn the details about both recent deaths. Written by DocRushing

Kort, from previous episodes, kills two men, then calls Gibbs and calls in a favor; at the scene Gibbs meets Kort, who falsely says that the two dead men, members of a mob, shot each other. Tony, McGee, and Ziva join at the site; another man, Perry, a CPA, arrives. Gibbs meets Perry, who says that he launders dirty money for Siravo, the head of the mob; Perry asks for immunity. Perry tells how to reach Flores, Siravo's second-in-command, with whom he communicates real-time via the chat room of an online game; McGee and Abby set a phony meet with Flores; Gibbs and Kort go to the meet, where they find two bodies. McGee deduces Siravo's hideout; Gibbs, Tony, McGee, and Ziva go there and find Siravo, who's unable to converse. The gang figure out Siravo's predicament, and McGee learns that Siravo's huge bank accounts are becoming drained; Gibbs guesses who's behind that. Gibbs and Tony intercept Perry, Kort, and several US marshals, then the whole case comes to a head. Written by DocRushing

Local cops, acting on a tip, find the body of Marine Pfc. Riggs, who was UA; Gibbs and company investigate; Palmer finds two marks on Riggs's neck. Meanwhile on a public street three grim-faced Hoovers demand that Abby go with them; a suit delivers her to Jones, an official at a well funded lab at a hospital for work in a clandestine and highly classified program. While checking out Riggs's car, Gibbs and Ziva find evidence suggesting that he was not an intended victim but rather a bad guy. Gibbs realizes that Abby has taken the place of Heller, the man who was Riggs's target; McGee and Ziva find Heller, who gives explanations. A patient disappears, and a nurse dies. Tony finds Abby; he and Ziva return her to the office. The gang start putting the pieces together; Jones disappears, but they catch him. Gibbs and Jones have a chat, and Abby helps Gibbs with his interrogation. The team finish putting the pieces together, then they tie up the loose ends. Written by DocRushing

In Arlington, Virginia, across the Potomac River from Washington, DC, Gibbs and company start investigating the slow, painful, tortured death of a Marine, Pfc. Nick Chandler, who had just returned from Kuwait and arrived from Los Angeles. Ziva receives phone calls and a visit by a man named Michael. Vance sends Gibbs to coordinate a joint gig with the NCIS Office of Special Projects in LA due to a suspected link between two cases; Gibbs takes McGee with him. The agent in charge of the OSP is Lara Macy, who's one of Gibbs's exes. Gibbs and McGee check in, then Gibbs meets Callen, an old friend; the OSP bunch confirm the link, involving a weapons dealer named Liam; McGoo loves the toys at the OSP office. Tony and Ziva, back in Washington, conduct a field interview of the two brothers who killed Nick. Gibbs and the OSP gang attend a party with fireworks. Michael, Ziva's visitor, meets Callen, posing as Liam, in LA. [To be continued.] Written by DocRushing

Gibbs and McGee continue to work with the NCIS Office of Special Projects in Los Angeles. Callen, posing as Liam, meets a potential buyer of illicit arms; the meet turns sour because the buyer is Rifkin, an undercover agent of the Mossad, who says that he pursues the same terrorist cell as does the OSP. Macy reveals that she and Gibbs met each other 18 years ago. Rifkin goes his way, and the OSP guys seek Rifkin's next targets; Callen again poses as Liam. Two members of the cell die, and Rifkin drops out of sight. OSP agents swarm a shop and seize the remaining sleepers of the cell; Gibbs intercepts Rifkin and tells him to go home. Nate, the staff shrink, tells Gibbs a little story, and Gibbs nods to a surveillance camera, believing that Macy watches. Tony wonders about Ziva. McGeek enjoys the fancy toys. One more shooting takes place. Gibbs and McGee return home, and Rifkin heads back to Tel Aviv with a stop in Washington, DC. Written by DocRushing

During a poker game at the home of the SecNav, an ICE agent, Sherman, dies while on the protection detail; the SecNav assigns the investigation to the NCIS with support from the FBI and ICE. Ziva finds a fly on a wall, Julia (an ICE agent) stomps the bug, Abby expresses displeasure, and Tony finds a severed tongue. Ziva goes up a tree, and Ducky puts a choker hold on Fornell. Ducky says that Sherman died of a stroke. Julia reveals a few details to Tony and Ziva, then Gibbs counsels Julia about withholding details. Tony arranges a meeting with Michael. Gibbs, Fornell, and Julia trace a lead on an invisible man; at his motel room they find his body plus photographs and a floor plan of the SecNav's home; Ducky says that he took a suicide capsule. The SecNav visits Gibbs while he works on his boat. Acting on a clue, Tony goes to Ziva's pad and finds Michael; shortly Ziva arrives and finds Tony and Michael, the latter of whom is dead. Written by DocRushing

When Ziva returns to her pad one evening, she finds Tony and Michael on the floor; Michael is barely alive. Michael soon dies at a hospital; Gibbs arrives there and speaks briefly with Tony and Ziva. The next morning Gibbs and McGee go to Ziva's home; before they enter the building, Ziva's place explodes. McGee finds a hidden laptop computer, three cuts in a gas line, and a possible trigger for the explosion. Ducky validates Tony's explanation. Vance, in response to a request from Eli David, the head of Mossad (Ziva's father), Vance, Gibbs, Tony, and Ziva, along with Michael's body, go to Tel Aviv. Eli interviews Tony, Ziva learns who set the fire, and Tony and Ziva have a nice little chat. McGee and Abby find many answers. Vance, Gibbs, and Tony return to Washington, DC, without Ziva by her own decision. During a mission for Mossad in Somalia in the Horn of Africa, Ziva becomes imprisoned, tortured, and questioned about the NCIS. [To be continued.] Written by DocRushing