- After a scientist is decapitated by a strangulation device in a park, Gibbs and his team search for the woman who was her former research partner in Russia in order to learn who is behind her murder. They learn it may be a familiar foe.
- A scientist is killed in gruesome manner. The team investigates, they're summoned by the SecNav to meet them at the Pentagon. They meet with a Russian official who tells them that Mishnev, the man who tried to kill Gibbs is involved. He tells them that one of their scientists who is a friend of the one who was killed is suspected of murder and is now in the US. He wants them to find her. Gibbs wonders if the man has an agenda but the SecNav tells to do what he asks. They find themselves working with an FBI agent who seems to be some secrets too.—rcs0411@yahoo.com
- Two beat cops find a woman sitting on a park bench after dark. Upon closer inspection, they find she's been strangled by a wire. They also find she's still alive, but she warns them not to touch her. Her badge identifies her as Sofia Glazman, a laboratory researcher.
At the office, Tony and McGee read a sex tips article in a magazine. Ellie joins them and points out that as a married person she probably has more sex than the two of them combined. They're interrupted by Gibbs with the victim of the week -- a Navy research scientist. She's still alive.
But at the scene, they learn that's not true. The beat cops explain the woman didn't want to be moved, but they couldn't get the wire off. The EMTs got her into the ambulance, but no one saw the device.
At the ambulance, Gibbs is surprised to see two body bags. Glanzman's head is laying on the floor of the ambulance, standard procedure requires a severed head go in its own bag. Tony finds a mechanized garrote (from the movie "The Counselor") which just keeps tightening until it lops the victim's head off. There's no timer or remote, it just got jammed, which is why she was begging not to be moved. The jostling into the ambulance started it again. They conclude the killer was sending a message.
Back at NCIS, Ellie and McGee talk to Sofia's boss, Doctor Ishmael Havana. He wants Sofia's notes back for a test they're running tomorrow morning. They're working on using lasers for data transfer.
Sofia grew up in Moscow and Dr. Havana recruited her to work for him. He identifies Dr. Nellie Benin, Sofia's college lab partner in Russia, from a photo. She works for the Russians and she and Sofia had a professional rivalry but were best friends.
Down in the lab, Abby tells Gibbs a thin chemical residue inside the garrote caused it to jam. It was pot smoke. Abby can match the stash if they find it.
Gibbs and Tony get called to the basement of the Pentagon to meet with the Secretary of the Navy Sarah Porter (Leslie Hope) -- in the men's room. Tony is there to stand guard.
Inside, Porter tells the men that a foreign embassy says it has information on Glanzman's murder.
In the hallway, a beautiful woman comes out of the women's room and sees Tony standing there. She flirts with him, but they're interrupted by the arrival of Russian Counselor Anton Pavlenko. They take turns casually assigning blame for the downed copter rescue mission until Porter calls them into the men's room.
Gibbs takes exception to Pavlenko calling it an "accident." Pavlenko says he's there to ask for help. He tells them Nellie Benin is working for Sergei Mishnev. A colleague of Benin's was found dead by a mechanical garrote a few days ago.
Benin is in DC and Pavlenko wants NCIS to help find her, in cooperation with the FBI.
Out in the hallway, Tony asks for the woman's name and number. Porter comes out and introduces her as FBI Special Agent Leia Pendergast, their partner on the case.
At NCIS, Pendergast holds their secure briefing in MTAC. She mentions that she hates "Star Wars," because her first name is Leia. Tony is still intrigued.
All she knows is the date Benin entered the country. McGee and Ellie explain that Benin appears to have been a model Russian citizen, and not someone who would turn to terrorism and murder.
Down in the lab, Pendergast meets Abby, who grills her. She's also not impressed by Leia's rabbit's food. Abby shows Leia an email from a junk account to Sofia Glazman, which mentions a meeting at a bar on the other side of the park around the time of the murder. Abby got the email off Glazman's computer and traced the junk email back to Moscow.
Back in the office, Tony is dwelling on Leia, but Ellie tells him she's just flirting with him to get closer to the investigation.
They have surveillance from the airport when Benin arrived, after a delayed flight -- at the same time Glazman was killed in the park.
They get an alert about a call to Glazman's phone, from the bar beside the park. Ellie shares a theory that maybe Benin is running and trying to defect. The airport surveillance shows the Russians gave them bad info, and if she didn't kill Glazman, she probably didn't kill the man back in Moscow. She and McGee suggest the Russian could be calling her a killer because they don't want her to turn over state secrets.
Gibbs, Ellie and McGee head to the bar. Gibbs tells Tony to keep it from Leia.
At the bar, they see Nellie at the bar. McGee feels her out and quickly confirms she wants to defect. She's happy to go with them, but says she needs to use the bathroom first.
A blonde woman watches them.
Back at NCIS, Tony leads Leia on a long pointless tour of the office. When he mentions their desks are in the Stephen J. Cannell annex, she recognizes the name of the creator of the A-Team and Rockford files and realizes he's been stalling.
Back at the bar, Ellie watches over Nellie in the bathroom. The blonde woman sits unseen in a bathroom stall with the mechanical garrote in her hand. She's about to make her move when Gibbs comes in. The woman ducks out past him. As she wafts past he smells weed. He follows her but she goes out the side door and uses the garrote to close it and he can't follow her.
Back in interrogation, Nellie says she doesn't know who the woman is, but says she was working for Sergei Mishnev. She says she had never heard of Mishnev until last week when he approached her in a Russian café and offered her a job, but wouldn't say more.
She identifies the other garrote victim as her coworker Mikael, who she says Sergei also approached. The day after she got a call saying she'd be next if she didn't work for Mishnev. She reached out to her friend Sofia Glazman, not realizing she was putting her in harm's way. Nellie insists she's not a killer and wants asylum.
In Vance's office, Pavlenko confronts Sec Nav Porter about NCIS having Nellie. Vance tells Pavlenko that Nellie isn't a killer. He doesn't disagree and says he's ready to take her home. Porter won't confirm they have her, but Pavlenko leaves expecting their full cooperation.
After he's gone, Porter calls him an ass, but says he's right that they can't cause an incident by keeping Nellie. Vance is more concerned with finding out how Pavlenko knew they had Nellie.
Tony finds Leia and asks her if she told the Russians they had Benin, which she knows would be treason. She's been assigned to protect three Russian emissaries in the last three months and the Russian Embassy specifically requested her assignment to this case. They also have $28,000 in her account from an offshore account. She's annoyed at being accused, but Tony says he believes she's not the leak but needs it explained. Leia says it's from her dad. He came into money after she turned 17 and now he sends her $28,000 every year because of some sort of tax benefit. Tony recognizes her challenging relationship with her father.
Leia cuts things off to go get Nellie.
Vance and Gibbs escort her to Leia's car. Nellie protests that the Russians will kill her if they turn her over, but Vance says there's nothing they can do. He puts her in the car with Leia and they drive off.
Ellie comes down with an ID of the Russian hit woman, Renata Atal. She thinks that because they can identify the threat they can keep Nellie to protect her. Instead, Gibbs tells her to send the information to McGee and Tony.
On the road with Nellie, Leia tells her she understands her situation, but can't risk starting a war over her. Leia notices a black SUV closing in on them and pulls into a parking garage. She gets a call from Tony, who was following the SUV. He tells her to stay in the car.
Renata pulls up to Leia's car, but peels out when she sees Tony. She tries to drive off, but Tony and McGee stop her. They order her out of the car, telling her it's over. She says "I know," then grabs a garrote from the seat next to her, slips it around her neck and essentially cuts off her own head. Nellie has just one question: "How did this woman know I was being transferred?"
Back at the office, they still don't have enough evidence to connect Pavlenko -- the only one outside the office who knew Nellie was being transferred -- to the hit woman or Mishnev. Renata's SUV is in the garage and both parts of her are with Duckie.
Gibbs goes to the morgue with Leia, hoping for information on Renata's employer. Duckie doesn't have any. Abby joins them and reports the weed residue on the garrote matched the other two. She doesn't have anything from the car yet. Sec Nav Porter joins them and announces they're out of time, they have to turn over Benin.
Gibbs goes to the carport, where Pavlenko is waiting to take Nellie himself. Gibbs tells him to tell Sergei he said hi, then accuses him of continuing to lie.
When Leia brings Nellie down, Nellie gets anxious when she sees Pavlenko. She protests then suddenly she grabs Leia's gun from her holster and aims at Pavlenko. Gibbs and Tony draw, but Gibbs tells Tony to stand down. Tony doesn't understand, but listens.
Gibbs speaks to Benin in Russian telling her this isn't the answer. As he's trying to calm her down, Leia grabs her back-up weapon and shoots Leia twice in the chest. Gibbs checks on her. She's dead. Pavlenko is shaken and says it didn't have to end this way, but he'll tell Moscow that the Americans were a big help.
He gets in his car and leaves.
Later, McGee and Ellie photograph the crime scene. Nellie's body has been cleared. Sec Nav Porter comes down, furious about what happened. Gibbs remains calm. When McGee gets a call that Pavlenko is no longer in the Navy yard, Gibbs goes to the ambulance and shows a fully alive Benin inside.
"You said give the Russians what they wanted. We did," Gibbs says.
Tony talks to Leia, incredulous that she and Gibbs faked Benin's death without telling him. It was her one condition for going along with the plan. They flirt/argue over who's better at their job. He asks for her number again, but she points out he's the detective and can find it.
After she leaves, Ellie points out that Gibbs would never leave Tony out of the loop on something like this. He didn't.
"Then why fight with her?" Ellie asks.
"She fights back. I have a type," Tony says.
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