Episode: 4.21, Brothers in Arms
Air Date: April 24, 2007.
The Victim: Le Grenouill’es accountant. Seriously.
Emotionally Traumatized, But Ultimately Irrelevant, Witness Who Finds the Body: Director Shepard.
Plot Recap: Homeless people are in a homeless people crowd doing homeless people things. Except for the homeless person who has a blackberry. American poverty, amirite? He talks on it and asks if the person on the other end is alone. I guess he liked what he heard, because he gets up and approaches a car. Inside is Director Shepard. She asks if he brought it and, when he nods, she assures him he’s doing the right thing. He’s confident in that but wonders if he should be doing whatever he’s doing with her. She kicks him while he’s down and tells him he’s not a man with many options. This ends up being truer than even Shepard realizes as a nearby van turns on its headlights and accelerates. Shepard pulls her gun and yells “Get down! as machine gun fire rips out of the van. Shepard gets off a couple of shots at the fleeing van and destroys the back windows, but the perps get away. She asks, “You hit?” to her contact, but the bullet wound in the center of his forehead prevents him from answering.
Awkward.
How exactly does NCIS get jurisdiction over this one? Maybe they’ll tell us, but we come back from credits with our agents on the scene puzzling over what the hell the Director was doing hanging out with homeless guys at 0400. McGee says the other homeless guys don’t think the victim is homeless either (he smelled too clean), so mysteries upon mysteries. Ziva wonders if Shepard is running another op, but Tony doesn’t know anything about this one. Ziva wonders if he’d tell them, and Tony quickly walks away.
Shepard tells Gibbs the victim’s name is Webster.
No, not that Webster. Troy Webster. He had information on Le Grenouille, and while Shepard is precluded by CIA from pursuing Le Genouille on the theft of a Navy guidance system (See Blowback, Episode 4.14), Webster’s info would have allowed her to nail him on other counts. Which seems like something the CIA would also likely prefer not happen, but whatever. For his part, Gibbs is pissed he didn’t know what was going on, both of which have been trends this season. Shepard says she can take care of herself, and Gibbs doesn’t deny that, but notes that nobody was taking care of poor, dead Webster. Fortunately, Ducky walks up and interrupts before Shepard flings incinerates Gibbs with her laser vision.
Still, Shepard’s a pro, so she’s able to fully describe the murder vehicle- a Ford Excursion now missing its rear window- to the agents. Gibbs wants to know if it was shooting at Webster or her. NCIS knows the Director is a high value target, but, per McGee, “This guy…?
Back at the squad room, the team backgrounds Webster. Webster is a CPA and a money launderer. His number one client is Le Grenouille. Webster grew a conscience and was supposed to bring Shepard a file on all Le Grenouille’s shenanigans. But all they found on Webster was a blackberry. Shepard and Gibbs talk over each other giving the agents instructions, but it boils down to McGee and Abby searching the blackberry for hidden directories, and Tony and Ziva hunting for the shooter. Then Gibbs and Shepard adjourn to her office, maybe to shout at each other.
In Shepard’s office, Shepard apologizes to Gibbs for taking over his team. She also thinks Gibbs thinks she’s being reckless. Gibbs wonders what she thinks. Oddly, she says that she thinks she’s taking the same chances Gibbs took when he was after Ari Haswari. As Gibbs notes, this is different because he wasn’t the Director of NCIS. As I note (and noted obliquely in the write-up for Kill Ari (Part Two), Episode 3.2), this is different because she basically accused Gibbs then of being Captain Ahab, obsessively chasing the white whale. It makes her come off a bit hypocritical here. Especially when she says that being Director gives her prerogatives.
Shepard tells Gibbs that Webster contacted her three months ago and got cold feet. Webster then called last night about an impending arms shipment, and Gibbs thinks the whole thing is a trap. Shepard disagrees, but admits he’s not wrong to be suspicious. Shepard says Gibbs thinks her personal feelings are clouding her judgment. Of course, as she notes, Gibbs has no idea why this chase for Le Grenouille is personal (neither does the audience, at this stage). Gibbs repeats Shepard’s mantra this season that he “has no need to know.” Then he asks how far she’s willing to go. As far as Gibbs went to get Ari is the chilling response.
Gibbs visits Ducky, who is trying to do a dental exam and confirm Abby’s fingerprint findings on Webster.
But, at present, Ducky wants to talk bullets. The accuracy of the shots (two kill shots to the heart, one to the head) is uncanny, meaning that if the Director were the target, she’d be dead. As for Webster, the shooter may have wasted his bullets. Per Ducky, Webster had an inoperable brain tumor. Gibbs thinks that could explain the sudden shift to the side of the angels. Ducky pulled Webster’s medical records as well, and there’s no mention of the tumor. Even though Webster had to have been experiencing symptoms.
At that moment, the power in autopsy fluctuates and blacks out before coming back on. Abby comes over the monitor, her image surrounded by smoke, and apologizes.
In Abby’s lab, McGee is using the fire extinguisher on Abby’s computer. Gibbs and Shepard arrive and McGee reports that Webster’s blackberry uploaded a virus onto Abby’s computer. The virus tricked the surge protector into thinking a lightning strike occurred and [technobabble] and destroyed the computer. Shepard would like to know if any data on Le Grenouille is recoverable from the blackberry, and she’s not asking in a way that should make Abby or McGee feel comfortable saying no. But say no, they do. Abby even foolishly moves in for a hug before the screaming starts. Shepard calls their actions careless wants to know how many more lives will be ruined before they bring in Le Grenouille. Gibbs asks how many have been ruined so far. Shepard backs off at that, but now, in the absence of an arms dealing case, Shepard wants Le Grenouille busted for the murder of Webster. Then she leaves, and Abby whispers, “Wow.” Gibbs just stares and then turns black and white as we head to commercial.
Shepard has set up a meeting with the CIA. Gibbs seems amazed that it’s happening on NCIS turf. The appointment arrives, Cynthia announces him, and…
…it’s Fornell. We’re excited, but I imagine Shepard feels a bit of an anticlimax. She points out that Langley hates the FBI. Fornell acknowledges this, but says, “Not as much as they hate you right now.” Fornell isn’t sure how Shepard pissed off CIA, but he was tapped to come on down and smooth things over. Shepard wants face time with Trent Kort, who we know from Blowback, is a CIA asset embedded in Le Grenouille’s operation. She tells Fornell that she thinks Kort will have information on the assassination of one of her informants. Fornell thinks that’s reasonable, but it’s CIA so they’re going to tell her to go to hell. Gibbs smirks at that and Shepard says to remind CIA that they owe her, and to ask them to tell him if he wants to know more. Now it’s Fornell’s turn to smirk.
In the evidence garage, Tony meets Abby. She’s happy and then sad because he brought the others when she said, “Come alone.” But Tony is done keeping secrets. Sort of. Abby tells them that the ballistics confirm that the slugs in Webster’s body and the slugs in Shepard’s car came from the same place. The tires tracks match the make and model vehicle that Shepard described. She can’t find the Director’s slugs because they’re in the van, but the shattered glass from the van window has blood on it. It can’t be from anywhere but inside, so Shepard hit a guy through a tinted window in a car going 40 mph. The agents would high-five Shepard were she there. Abby is running DNA on the injured van occupant.
The agents are happy and start to leave, but Abby stops them. She’s not sure what to do with what she found in Shepard’s car. It’s a pair of panties she found in the glove compartment. So, Abby can either log the evidence for the entire federal government to read or take it off the log and commit a federal crime. McGee says ask the Director. Abby says no thank you. They all agree that Tony should ask the Director. Tony agrees they should draw straws. His phone rings…
It’s his girlfriend of all season, Dr. Jeanne Benoit. She wants Tony to meet her mother. A forensic tech starts up a cutting tool of some sort and Tony frantically motions for him to be quiet and blows off Jeanne’s questions about it. She says he can explain over dinner…with Mom. Tony says he has to work late. She protests, and he says he’ll see what he can do. She promises to make it worth his while and they hang up. Abby appears with straws.
In MTAC, somebody hands Shepard a file. She tells him to schedule a briefing in an hour and get her Tony. Tony walks in. Guess he drew the short straw. He tells her “You first.” The bug that Tony put in the luggage of Regine, one of Le Grenouille’s operatives (See Smoked, Episode 4.10), has gone dark. Shepard worries that if Regine found the bug and can ID when Tony placed the bug, Le Grenouille might be able to determine who placed it.
Shepard gets a call and it’s Fornell. Tony is curious and she explains Fornell’s role. Tony smiles and wonders if they chose Fornell because it would make Shepard easier to handle. Shepard says they drew straws and Fornell lost. Tony shifts uncomfortably, and Shepard says it’s hard to imagine grown adults drawing straws to see who has to deal with her. Then she asks what Tony wanted. He shrugs and she leaves. Then he glances at the straw in his hand and grimaces.
Abby has a new computer. She pulls out a portable camera and takes a selfie with it. Gibbs appears. Abby finished the DNA test on the SUV blood. The spatter indicated it came from the driver. The blood didn’t match any of the databases she used. However, she determined that the driver has a rare disease with an even rarer treatment, and she tracked the guy to a local pharmacy. She hands Gibbs the address.
The agents arrive at the perp’s apartment in force. They even brought a warrant, although Gibbs kicks in the door before McGee can finish telling him that Agent Lee said to wait fifteen seconds after announcing to do so. They find the remnants of a man trying to home treat a bullet wound. Then they find the man, and he’s dead.
Shepard is drinking on the job when Ducky visits. She read his autopsy report and realizes she killed the perp with her gunshot into his fleeing van. The perp might have been salvageable with proper medical attention, but that’s what happens when you get shot committing a crime and don’t want an ER record. Shepard is super-annoyed with herself for killing a star witness to her informant’s murder, though. There’s always the shooter if they can find him, but Ducky doubts he’ll give Shepard what she wants.
That’s right- it’s intervention time. Shepard gets icy and pours herself another work drink. Ducky makes it sound like he’s just here to talk about his psych profile of Le Grenouille (whom Ducky met in person while undercover in Blowback, Episode 4.14). Ducky doesn’t think Le Grenouille is the kind of person who solves his problems with violence. He’s an arms dealer, but too sophisticated to order drive by shootings. Shepard doesn’t make reference to Ducky getting his degree in forensic psychology between episodes earlier this season, but she does think his objectivity has been compromised by his genuinely finding Le Grenouille charming. She thinks it’s clouding Ducky’s judgment. Never one to turn the other beak, Ducky suggests that maybe someone else’s judgment is being clouded. Like maybe a lady who drinks at work. Shepard tells Ducky he doesn’t know Le Grenouille like she does. That would be useful information for a profile, an investigation, all manner of operations necessary to take down an arms dealer…but, once again, Shepard declines to share her personal history with Le Grenouille.
In the squad room, Gibbs looks up at Ducky as he exits. They have a telepathic conversation and Gibbs wanders up to join Ducky in the elevator. Gibbs asks about the chat with the Director and Ducky shuts down the elevator for a private conversation. Classic Gibbs move. Good thing too, since the conversation with the Director was all at Gibbs’s urging. Ducky reports that he thinks the Director’s objectivity is compromised. Gibbs asks why. Ducky says there’s a history, something that’s consuming her. But he can’t provide details. He does think she’s obsessed.
Tony lost the battle to avoid meeting Jeanne’s mom, and now Jeanne is in the rest room at the restaurant and Tony is concerned Mom will show before she gets back. So concerned that he calls Jeanne, even though she’s only twenty feet away. Tony is shockingly nervous about this very routine part of dating someone…and hell, maybe he should be because Mom rolls up and already knows who he is by his “overpriced shoes.” Jeanne arrives to prevent further bloodshed.
Gibbs picks up a bridal magazine at a newsstand. Shepard’s wondering what the hell, but he’s just messing with her. They get into a limousine. With Trent Kort. He sneers at Shepard nearly derailing his op. Shepard calls it doing her job. Fornell would like them to be nice and appeals to Gibbs. Gibbs doesn’t literally say, “My name’s Bennet and I ain’t in it,” but he might as well have. Shepard gets down to brass tacks, but Kort doesn’t think Le Grenouille would order a hit. Although he admits he doesn’t know everything because Le Grenouille keeps everything…“Need to know?” Gibbs finishes and manages not to chuckle. Shepard doesn’t care about whether Kort thinks Le Grenouille did it. She wants to know who he would have used for something on the order of a hit. Kort IDs Andre Jones, Le Grenouille’s American small arms dealer. If it went down, Jones would be the only person Le Grenouille would trust.
At the restaurant, Mom and Jeanne are talking shop (Mom’s a doctor too). Dr. Mom is also divorced and not fond of Jeanne’s father. Dr. Mom turns her sights on Tony and asks how long he has been sleeping with her daughter. Seriously. Tony actually answers this impertinent question. And then decides to play on Dr. Mom’s field. He seizes the advantage by acknowledging that since Dr. Mom told him she knew everything about him, she knows he’s “new at commitment” and gets that she’s concerned that Jeanne is being taken advantage of. Dr. Mom knows he’s not taking advantage because she sees the way Tony looks at Jeanne, but she also sees the doubt in his eyes and doesn’t want to see Jeanne hurt the way Jeanne’s father hurt Dr. Mom.
It’s the next day and Tony is strapping on a bulletproof vest and wishing he’d had one the night before. They’re enacting a raid on Jones, who has a rep/record for being a bad dude. Shepard is monitoring form MTAC via a camera on McGee’s cap. Ziva arrives to overhear the conversation about Jones and she doesn’t think he looks so tough. She confirms Jones is on site and alone, and she took out the alarm. McGee goes with Gibbs. Tony and Ziva approach from the other side. Shepard carps about making sure they take Jones alive.
The agents pick the locks. They enter what looks to be an auto garage and train their guns on Jones. He asks if Le Grenouille sent them and grumbles about having done a favor. He tries to flee but runs into Tony and Ziva. Shepard stresses that she needs Jones alive, but Jones has other ideas. He sees a gun on a tool bench. McGee sees it too and tells him not to do it. But Jones reaches for the gun, shots are exchanged, and the camera goes out. Shepard asks Tony for a sitrep. Tony is staring at the busted camera on the floor, but the show camera pans up and McGee is alive, though a little shell-shocked. Ziva reports that the team is fine. Gibbs adds, “Uh, the suspect isn’t.” Shepard scowls.
Gibbs visits Shepard in her office. Shepard says she feels like Jones got what he deserved. Gibbs doesn’t care about Jones and says, “You and me are gonna have a little talk.”
In the squad room, the agents discuss Le Grenouille selling out Jones. Since Jones was the only link to hanging a murder charge on Le Grenouille, Le Grenouille let NCIS find out about him. Le Grenouille figured Jones would be mad enough to fight back, and, sure enough, NCIS took care of the witness for him. Ducky arrives to add to Le Grenouille’s deviousness quota. Ducky called Webster’s physician and came away from the conversation convinced that the doctor knew about Webster’s tumor and was either bribed or threatened to keep silent. Le Grenouille didn’t want Webster knowing he was dying because dying men tend to want to atone for their sins. Of course, per Ducky, Webster’s neurological deficits would have been pronounced, so he likely figured it out anyway, hence his rush to clear his ledger.
Gibbs and Shepard stand off. He says her job is not one he’d want. She responds that nobody is offering it. “You know why?” he asks. She lays out a few reasons including his impatience, his lack of respect for authority, and his inability to work and play well with others. They don’t really get to the other reasons because she starts preemptively promising that she’s not letting her personal feelings compromise her judgment and then angrily demands to know if there’s anything wrong with putting an arms dealer out of business. Gibbs says no, but wants to know if that’s what she’s really after. What else would she be after, she asks. Gibbs doesn’t know, but figures at the rate she’s going she won’t be Director much longer. Shepard says it’s good that he’s watching her back and Gibbs’s cell phone rings. Abby is on the line, but we can’t hear. Gibbs hangs up and tells Shepard she may get the chance to put Le Grenouille out of business after all.
Abby is tracing something across the globe via computer. Gibbs and Shepard arrive. Abby found a pattern in Jones’s calls and bank records. He gets a call from an encrypted line, money walks out of his account, and 48 hours later, his phone goes off the grid. Essentially, he gets the offer, pays the money, makes the pick-up in a way that he can’t be tracked. Abby can’t trace the encrypted phone, but she is familiar with the encryption algorithm. It’s the same one that Le Grenouille’s people used to reach out to Charles Harrow, the CIA’s undercover guidance system seller from Blowback, Episode 4.14. Per Abby, the grand finale is that Jones made his last phone call the previous day, meaning that a shipment is coming in less than 24 hours. Abby says that’s what Webster was probably going to tell Shepard, but Shepard and Gibbs are already gone.
Shepard and Kort are meeting in a park. Kort is adamant that Le Grenouille not only didn’t have Webster killed, but specifically warned people off Webster.
Fornell and Gibbs are off in the distance. Fornell asks if he knows what Shepard’s beef is, and Gibbs does not.
Kort says that Jones went rogue because Webster giving up evidence to the feds would hurt Jones as bad as it would hurt Le Grenouille. Jones thought Le Grenouille sold him out as punishment for Webster’s death. Kort thinks Le Grenouille had his own plans for Webster and that Webster is probably better off dead. Le Grenouille is good at ruining people’s lives.
Fornell wants to know if Shepard is hot for all arms dealers or if it’s just Le Grenouille. Gibbs is cagey, but Fornell dopes out that it’s this guy specifically and Gibbs doesn’t know the reason.
Kort doesn’t think Le Grenouille has any upcoming deliveries. As far as he knows. However, arms shipments require an end-user certificate. Shepard says they’ve been unable to get Le Grenouille because all of his buyers manage to get one. Kort says this requires either a forger or a third world general. Shepard picks up what Kort is putting down and asks which one of those Jones had.
In observation, the agents think the man in interrogation looks like a teacher, and he is an art teacher as his cover. Gibbs and Shepard handle the interrogation. The man pleads ignorance as to why he’s present. Shepard asks Gibbs about the penalties for forgery for arms paperwork. Then she puts a pencil and piece of paper in front of the suspect and says that the details of the shipment would go a long way toward keeping him out of Gitmo. The forger admits to working with Jones but says Jones makes him leave dates and times blank and they’re added by Jones’s shell company. Shepard asks for a name.
Gibbs and Shepard walk briskly into the squad room with the name Abbot Industries. The company is almost non-existent, but McGee finds a record of their imports and gets the location of a recent shipment and the container number.
NCIS is walking across a shipping yard with port authority personnel. According to the port authority, the shipment in question was never picked up and is due to be returned. The team is just in time to take custody. Shepard, still in heels and her business attire leads the way. The agents lag behind and McGee wonders if she’ll relax a bit once this is over. Ziva thinks it’s just beginning. Even if hey trace the weapons back to Le Grenouille, he’ll go underground, and the team will have to find him. They reach the container. Shepard tells the port authority to open it. She triumphantly says, “I got you.” And this would be correct, except the guns inside the crates are realistically crafted squirt guns. There’s also a bottle of fine cognac and a letter to Webster congratulating him on his new career and signed Le Grenouille. Ziva says, “We have nothing.” Gibbs says, “We never did.” Shepard angrily stalks off. Tony notes that Le Grenouille is good. McGee appends, “Really good.” Gibbs, watching an angry Shepard walk away says, “He’d better be.”
Quotables: Nothing of note.
Ziva-propisms: Tony mentions wanting to be a fly on the wall while Gibbs and Shepard bicker, and Ziva doesn’t get it. Ziva also says, “The bigger they are, the louder they fall,” when she means, “harder.”
Tony Awards: Tony’s really lying down on the job of late.
Abby Road: No roads lead from Abby.
McNicknames: McGee has a teasing-free day.
Ducky Tales: Ducky talks about Mata Hari and the lack of proof in her case. He tries to school the Director on the vintage of Le Grenouille’s cognac, but she has even less patience for him than Gibbs usually does.
The Rest of the Story:
-Shepard and Gibbs bandy some Rules back and forth, but only enumerate them by number. Regardless, if you watched, Blowback, Episode 4.14, you know that Rule #1 is “never screw over your partner,” and Rule #4 deals with the best way to keep secrets.
-Ari Haswari, Ziva’s half-brother, killed NCIS agent Kate Todd to poke at Gibbs in Twilight, Episode 2.23. Ziva killed Ari in Kill Ari (Part Two), Episode 3.2.
Casting Call: Nobody of note.
Man, This Show Is Old: Ziva shows McGee a blackberry and he says, “That’s a nice phone.”
I don’t think a show in the #Metoo era would make a subplot point about the humor of a powerful woman having a pair of panties in her glove compartment, and nobody wanting to tell her they found them.
We get an early appearance of a selfie, as Abby takes one with a handheld digital camera.
MVP: Nobody looks good here. Gibbs wins for managing to float above it all. He somehow comes off looking more “I told you so,” than stupid when the team finds the water guns.
Rating: This one was fun for some reason, but I’m not sure why. Shepard comes off looking like a nut. Consequently, the team looks like enablers. It’s like going on one last bender with the guy who can no longer control his drinking. You’re optimistic about having a fun night because you’ve had fun nights in the past, but then he pees on himself and falls off the bar stool and you’re asked to leave the establishment. You knew it was coming, you went out anyway, you feel stupid. And there’s that one snarky friend (here Gibbs) who’s acting above it all. It makes for a good story, but it’s terrible to experience.
Six Palmers.
Next Time: Another plot involving a blind dude.
A Year of NCIS 