Na centrále NCIS je zaznamenán telefonát ženy, která tvrdí, že byla unesena. Agenti prověří její totožnost. Jde o poručíka Amandu Wilkersonovou, která působí na ministerstvu námořnictva ve Washingtonu. Nehlásí se ani v práci, ani na mobilním telefonu. Gibbs se se svými kolegy pouští do pátrání. Snaží se najít důvod, proč byla unesena. Zjistí, že Wilkersonová je příslušnicí ochrany. Měla na starosti tajný převoz nukleárního odpadu a konkrétně plánovala trasy, kudy vlak pojede. Na jejím oddělení nastala mimořádná situace. V noci odjel z elektrárny v Ohiu náklad jaderných palivových článků. Cíl cesty je přísně tajný, jen pár lidí ví přesnou trasu, kudy vlak pojede a poručík Wilkersonová je zřejmě jednou z nich. NCIS se rozhodla po tomto zjištění vlak zastavit až do doby, než se podaří ženu najít.

Ze záznamu začíná být jasné, že je žena zavřena v kufru auta a má tak 12-17 hodin na přežití. Jak se však později zjistí, žena trpí akutní bronchitidou, tudíž se její čas krátí o dalších sedm hodin.

Vyšetřovatelé procházejí její záznamy v počítači. Na daný den si žena vzala dovolenou a v 8,30 měla sjednanou schůzku. Veškeré informace v počítači jsou zakódované a není právě lehké se k nim dostat. Ukazuje se, že žena pracovala v neziskové organizaci sledující pedofily na internetu. Na jednom z kamerových záznamů z místa schůzky si vyšetřovatelé všimli značky vozu, který byl tentýž den odcizen. Navíc někdo začal používat její mobil ...

Zdroj:

NCIS receives a call on a Sunday morning from a woman claiming to be Lt. Comdr. Amanda Wilkerson stating she's been abducted & needs help. The rest of the team is called in but McGee is unreachable. (breaks Gibbs' Rule #3), Tony & Ziva are sent to her house to investigate, Abby is given the call tape to analyze. The house is incredibly tidy.

Tony and Ziva are surprised by the security guard, but in a comic scene where he tries to handcuff them to each other (because he does not believe they are law enforcement agents), they overpower him and they return to the office with Wilkerson's computer. Meanwhile, Gibbs has found out from Wilkerson's superior that the Lt. Cmdr was involved in the transport of nuclear materials and she was only one of three people who knew what route a shipment of fuel rods, on a freight train, would take. The train is stopped while they find out what has happened to Wilkerson.

Wilkerson was involved in the planning of the route, but not in the operation, so she was not at work when she was kidnapped. In fact, she had specifically requested that day off. Why?Abby calculates the team only has a short time (maybe twelve hours plus a bit) to find the Lt.Cmdr as she is in a car trunk with limited oxygen. Later, Ducky shortens the time by several hours after finding the Lt. Cmdr has been treated for bronchitis a few days previously.McGee turns up, to some teasing, especially he has a writer's pipe with him.

Abby says the computer, in contrast with the house, is incredibly messily organized. They find her scheduler program and Tony and Ziva rush to the place of her last known appointment, a mall, where they find her car, empty. Ziva succeeds in breaking into it where Tony fails. They find a camcorder with some dodgy material on it - about money and transport to a safe house. from the computer, the team discovers when they visit that Wilkerson did volunteer work at an organization which combats online ********** (by monitoring **********) called PBJ meaning that her abductor may not have been a terrorist but a ********* she was tracking. They speak with the manager, Ross Logan and find out that the previous night, Wilkerson had been at PBJ online chatting with a *********. The team take the relevant PBJ computer away. When the team listens to the recording again, and can hear the noise of the railroad, they are able to know where the call is made from (only one set of railway tracks is the right distance away). But it is going to take longer to search the area than Wilkerson has left in the boot. Fortunately there is CCTV of the railroad crossing, and a picture of a car passing at the right time, from which Tony can identify the make and model (a Mercedes 560) and Gibbs can work out the registration number. The team goes to interview to the owner, a Mr. Lafferty, who has reported the car stolen that morning and has not seen the car since the previous night. We see that he breeds fish.

Wilkerson's cell phone is used again and the team rush to its location to save her, but find two teenagers have the phone. Tony and Ziva interrogate the teens by threatening them and leaving so they can 'discuss their options'. However Tony leaves the speaker phone on his desk turned on, and he and Ziva overhear their deliberations enough to find out how they got the phone. The humour in this scene is brilliantly done. Meanwhile, McGee and Abby are trying to trace the ********* with whom Wilkerson had been chatting, but it takes Gibbs to tell them that the recent events (car theft, use of the phone) narrow down the IP addresses of the computers. it turns out that the man is Lafferty. They rush over back to the house, but Lafferty has gone, and is unlikely to return because he has poisoned his pride and joy, his fish. We learn however, he cannot flee abroad, his passport has expired.

McGee interrogates the boy who sold the phone to the two teens, using his experiences as a teenage geek and the boy tells where he found the phone (the mall). So the team rush there.Back at the mall a balaclava-ed man is approaching an isolated parked car. It is Lafferty's Mercedes. he goes to open the boot and out comes Ziva with a gun. The rest of the team appears and they all surround the man.It turns out to be Ross Logan, the PBJ worker.

Logan's story is that PBJ's work is 100% surveillance, not confrontation of **********. Therefore, when Logan found out Wilkerson was intending to meet Lafferty, he went along to check she was going to be OK, and then, when Lafferty ran off (without his car), Logan kidnapped her (this bit seems a bit contrived to me) initially he says to teach her a lesson and scare her into keeping to surveillance. So it was nothing to do with the nuclear fuel at all!The team admonish Logan, telling him that as a result of his actions Wilkerson has had to go to naval hospital. When he is interrogated about Lafferty, he then changes his story and admits he was trying to frame the *********.

The team wonder where Gibbs is, did he go home, or is he still pursuing Lafferty? and sure enough, he is looking at CCTV footage (at the airport?) and identifying Lafferty, who is arrested. The last frame shows Lafferty looking up into the CCTV camera.