Trama

A Navy petty officer dies of a gunshot in a park in Baltimore, Maryland; Gibbs and company investigate; at the scene Tony sees a clue and a man. Abby finds links, then the gang put the pieces together and nail the shooter. Tony nods off.

A Navy petty officer (cryptologic technician first-class) dies of a single gunshot to the back in a park in Baltimore, Maryland; Gibbs and company investigate; at the scene both a clue and a man attract Tony's attention; Delilah joins the gang for this case. Abby shows Gibbs the victim's notebook computer and tells him about it; she also links Tony's clue (purple chewing gum) to the man whom Tony saw at the scene; Tony links that man, Anton, to one of his cases at the Baltimore PD, and he finds him again but loses him again. Gibbs and McGeek meet a headhunter, who provides missing answers, and who invites McNerd to call her. Tony goes to Anton's sister's pad, where he runs into Gibbs and McGee, and where the three of them find merchandise but no sister (because she has disappeared); later they find Anton elsewhere. Gibbs and Tony put the pieces together, find the bad guy and arrest him, and find the sister and return her to Anton. Tony finally gets some sleep.—DocRushing

A wounded man stumbles through the woods at night. He reaches the road and sees a stopped car. He tries to call for help, but can't manage the words and the couple inside is arguing and doesn't notice him. Before he reaches them, he's shot. They drive off.

At the office, McGee is surprised to see Tony at work at 7 a.m. He got a lot done in the morning, because he hasn't slept. McGee has noticed Tony has been different the past few weeks (with Ziva gone). Tony admits it's been a few days since he slept.

Before McGee can pester further, Gibbs arrives with the body of the week: A dead sailor outside Baltimore.

At the park, walking to the crime scene, Tony crunches coffee beans and rejects McGee's offer of sleeping pills.

The victim is first class Petty Officer Andrew Wells, he was a cryptotech who just returned from overseas. McGee says he was staying in a really nice hotel room and goes to check it out.

Tony notices one of the lookie loos stands out from the crowd of joggers. The man runs when Tony calls after him, saying he knows him. Tony loses him. Gibbs notices Tony acting strangely.

Tony picks up a wad of Choward's grape gum at his feet.

Back in the office, Delilah Fielding is sitting at Ziva's desk and tells Tony she's joining the team. She's joking, the DOD sent her over because Andrew Wells had top level clearance. He was due to report to a base this morning.

Tony has a pack of Choward's gum, which takes him back to 15 years ago when he was a beat cop in Baltimore, busting a kid named Anton Markin with gum and stolen cell phones.

McGee reports Wells was staying at a $1,000 a night hotel and had $10,000 cash in his room. They sent his laptop to Abby to go over.

In the lab, Abby doesn't have permission to log on, so she took it apart instead. She finds the insides don't match the case and it has spyware in it.

Down in the morgue, Duckie knows Ziva is the reason Tony isn't sleeping. Tony thinks he's starting to hallucinate.

Up in the office, McGee reports Wells' room was paid for by Amy Linden, a private defense contractor who used to work for Chinese tech companies. He called her repeatedly in the past few days. She could be Wells' handler and Gibbs wants them to pick her up.

Gibbs goes with McGee when he sees how out of it Tony is.

Abby brings Tony the DNA report on the gum -- it belongs to a fugitive wanted for stabbing a Russian mobster, the kid he busted all those years ago, Anton Markin.

15 years ago

Anton cooperated with Tony on the name of the guy he got the cell phones from, but Tony knows he's part of a Russian crime syndicate so he takes him to his apartment to press him. He knows Anton was present at the murder of a truck driver recently. Anton admits it, but says he waited in the car and didn't know anyone was killed. Tony leans on him to cooperate, but Anton is worried about his sister.

Tony goes to his old apartment, which is boarded up. He finds Anton inside. Anton holds a gun on him, remembering how the last time Tony convinced him to help, he lost his life and his sister. Anton blames him for what happened to him, but Tony says running was his choice.

Anton hesitates shooting him and Tony takes the moment to swing at him. Anton runs and Tony follows, but he loses him.

Tony calls McGee to look up the address of Anton's sister Marie Markin, but asks him not to tell Gibbs.

Back at NCIS, Gibbs and McGee sit down with Amy Linden, who says she wanted Wells for his cryptology skills. She's a headhunter. The $10,000 was a signing bonus.

In the lab, Delilah is looking over Wells' computer and Abby is digitally scanning the bullet fragments.

Delilah finds a file she doesn't understand in Wells' computer and thinks it's something -- but it's his fantasy football team stats. They find he logged in from another computer.

McGee calls Gibbs to report Marie works at Rankoff's Bakery in east Baltimore. Gibbs hears the conversation.

Tony knows the bakery.

Flash back to 15 years ago Tony goes to the bakery looking for Anton, who's late for his shift. He meets Marie, who defends her brother, saying he only stole to get by. Tony is there because Anton missed a meeting with a detective. He promises to take care of Anton.

In the present, Tony runs into Milo, the owner's son who he met at the bakery 15 years ago. Milo gives Tony Marie's address.

When he gets there, he sees a broken window and blood inside. He hears a noise. But it's not Anton -- it's Gibbs.

Wells served overseas with Marie's husband, who died a couple weeks ago in the line of duty. They think Wells' beating started in the house.

Gibbs asks Tony about Anton. He killed one of the Russians he was informing on and skipped town, leaving Marie. But Tony doesn't think Anton killed Wells.

"It was just one of those cases, everything fell apart," Tony says. He knows Anton is a killer, he stabbed that guy 15 times. Tony just wants to find out what went wrong.

McGee shows Gibbs and Tony fingernail scratches in the garage. They find Marie's necklace. Gibbs looks around and find a hidden compartment in the garage with a stash of counterfeit laptops worth $300,000 on the street.

Back in the lab, Abby and Delilah worked together to crack the laptops and learn they can be traced. The spyware is American, planted to track the people smuggling them. The computers belong to US Customs.

Back upstairs, McGee explains Marie's husband was Sgt. Randy Hollister, whose partner was Jacob Spoke. Customs recently raided a warehouse owned by Spoke and arrested both men. They let Hollister go when they couldn't find the computers.

15 Years Ago Tony comes home to find Anton hiding in his apartment. Anton thinks his boss knows he's snitching, but Tony tries to convince him to go through with it, then leaves for the station to put the operation together, leaving Anton in his apartment to wait. It was Tony's first time running an informant.

At NCIS, Tony admits to Gibbs that he couldn't pull the trigger when Anton ran. "You followed your gut," Gibbs allows.

Tony thinks he can't rely on his instincts anymore. "I was wrong to trust Anton, maybe I was wrong about a lot of people," Tony says. "Are we still talking about the case?" Gibbs asks.

Tony says it's weird how no one will say Ziva's name. Every time he looks at her desk he feels like he made the wrong decision, except it wasn't him that made it. Gibbs still trusts him.

Gibbs, Tony and McGee go to Spoke's warehouse and find Anton with a gun on Spoke, demanding to know where his sister is. Tony convinces Anton to put down his gun, promising him they'll find Marie together.

Gibbs talks to Spoke in interrogation. He says he has no idea where Marie is. He is too scared of the people running the computer operation to rat on them.

Abby tells Gibbs the bullet that killed Wells was also used in a truck hijacking 15 years ago.

Tony talks to Anton, telling him everything that's happening is because of him and the Russian gangster he killed 15 years ago. Anton still blames Tony for not being there that night like he promised.

Anton tells Tony that that night 15 years ago, when Tony left to go back to the precinct to set up the operation, a guy came to Tony's apartment for him and took him to the shipyard. Anton says they were going to kill him and he grabbed the screwdriver in self defense. He ran because he knew how bad it looked.

He came back for Marie's husband Randy's funeral and they're still after him.

Tony goes to confront the person who told the gangsters that Anton was working with the police: Milo at the bakery. Milo goes for a gun, but Gibbs comes in the back and stops him.

It's the same make and model that killed Wells, which means he has Marie. Milo says he convinced the gangsters to let Marie live, but then Anton became his debt. He sent guys to watch Marie when she told him Anton was coming to Randy's funeral. His guys held the guy who showed up -- but it was Wells, not Anton.

Wells ran.

They demand to know where Marie is.

Later, Tony tells Anton that Marie is safe. Anton is in custody and being taken to Baltimore. Tony wants to help. He shows Marie in to hug her brother.

At the end of the day, Tony stays to make sure Anton is processed smoothly. Then he kicks up his feet, leans back in his chair, and promptly falls asleep.