3.18 - BaitThis is a featured page

◄ Previous Episode Season #: 3 Episode #: 18 Air Date: March 14, 2006 Next Episode ►
Bait
Synopsis:
The NCIS team must stop a teenage student from detonating a bomb attached to his body, while he's taking the other students hostage at a Quantico base high school. Gibbs tries to stop him when he enters the classroom, only to realize that there may be someone else controlling the teenage student from the outside. Meanwhile, while Gibbs is in the classroom, Tony is left in charge.

Episode Recap:
The show opens at a high school (I assume it’s on base - justifies SRT and NCIS involvement) where a student, Kody, is being picked on. He follows the bully into his classroom and unzips his hoodie revealing a bomb.

Opening Credits

The school is being evacuated as NCIS arrives. Tony recommends they follow his lead he’s been in this kind of situation before. Ziva reminds him its not her first time. McGee says he plays Counter Strike online. Tony’s not impressed. Gibbs sends Ziva and McGee to recon while he and Tony head inside. Ziva and McGee attempt to photograph the bomb through the windows, however Kody draws the blinds once she has taken a few pictures.

Inside the classroom a hostage is noisily sobbing. Kody tells her to calm down. When it appears she cannot, a fellow student explains she is asthmatic and is in the midst of an asthma attack, and needs her inhaler which is still in her locker. (As an asthmatic I have to say it was the most unconvincing asthma attack I have ever seen.) Kody sends the other student out to get the inhaler, telling her she must be the one to bring it back. Gibbs is not impressed with the “Robbie Robot” the marines want to send in to deliver the inhaler; it would also have the dissadvantage of delaying the arrival of the inhaler. He takes it himself and enters the classroom, leaving DiNozzo in charge on the outside.

Kody instructs another student to search Gibbs, empties his pockets. He then tells him to check his ears and wrists, Gibbs’ earpiece and mic are discovered. Kody tells the other student to step on them. Based on this Ziva thinks he’s trained, very well trained. She and Tony try to think of another way to get eyes and ears in the classroom. But Kody has already taped all the vents shut and sealed the doors. They can't get a camera inside.

Back at NCIS Abby and McGee are discussing how Kody’s tastes run a little dark. His room is black and his computer, which they are examining, is filled with death imagery. Abby says so what, the bomb sniffing dogs didn’t alert to anything at his home and no other markers (how to websites etc) were found. Maybe the bomb is a fake. Upstairs Jen is preparing to head out to Gibbs aid when Ducky arrives. He convinces her she would be more help here.

Meanwhile Gibbs is trying to use hostage negotiation tactics on Kody, trying to build a rapport with him. But Kody sees through it, refuses to listen. While he is peeking through the blinds Gibbs adjusts the thermostat, however Kody turns, convinced he just did something. Luckily, Tony arrives outside the door to chat. Kody’s demand is for his mother to be brought to the classroom, they have until sundown. His father has arrived meanwhile, and tells Ziva and Tony that Kody’s mother died last year and Kody has taken it hard. He even thought he saw her a few months ago, which is "normal" (Ducky bears this out later on). In order to relay this info to Gibbs, Tony tells Kody that “Special Agent Caitlin Todd is out looking for your mother.”

Jen has called Tony for a SITREP, she is concerned he won't be able to give the snipers a fire order if the opportunity arises. He says he’s done it before. Jen and Ducky decide to pursue the mother angle in case it gets that far. Meanwhile, Abby and McGee are able to hack into one of the 3 computers in the classroom that have web-cams and are wired to the Internet. They can now see through the web-cam’s video feed and can flash messages to Gibbs. Which is fortunate because Kody unzips his hoody, it's hot in there, and they have an image of the bomb.

Ziva, with her bomb expertise, identifies the bomb strapped to Kody and determines it will not be detonated if he is taken out via snipers. They soon have an opportunity to do so but DiNozzo tells them to stand down. Ziva questions him but he responds by saying that he can't shoot a 15-year old boy. "It's a Gibbs' thing. My gut." Back in the classroom Gibbs notices an earpiece in Kody's ear. With Kody at the front of the classroom, and Gibbs' back to him, he signs to Abby. At first, she's unable to make out what Gibbs is saying. But then she deciphers "PUPPET". Kody and the bomb are being controlled by someone else.

Abby and McGee frantically discuss and deduce that Kody must be controlled via earwig. They flash another message to Gibbs, while Kody’s back is turned, and he nods. But Kody demands to know why he's nodding. Gibbs denies that he's communicating to anyone outside the room. The baddies must have eyes in the room too. They are using one if the other computer’s web cams. Ziva thinks this is great news they can backtrace the feeds. The Marines get on the earwig while Abby and McGee follow the webcams trail. Tony, meanwhile is getting restless and wants to question Kody’s dad again to find out who might be using him. But when Tony asks for him, he is told “his boss” called him to NCIS. There is some confusion until they realize they mean Jen. Jen and Ducky ask the dad if he is involved in anything secret, what did his wife do? Nothing is apparent so they decide to dig deeper. The rest of the team independently comes to the conclusion that someone believes Kody's mother is NOT dead and this is a ruse to flush her out.

Ziva has come to the conclusion that the detonator Kody is holding isn’t real, since he is being controlled the baddies would have the real detonator. Tony made the right choice shooting Kody would not have done any good. The Marines want to shoot what must be the connection to the bomb, however that would kill Kody. Even Ziva says this is not an option. Unfortunately the earwig communication is only coming in short bursts and they can not get a fix. McGee and Abby come to the rescue though. They have followed the webcam trail, and have a location- just outside the base. They want to know if they should cut the feed, Tony says he has a better idea. They insert a video loop (we don't learn this immediately). So the baddies, who are sitting in a van contemplating the imminent blowing up of Kody, and more importantly for them, his mum, carry on looking at a classroom full of hostages when really it is empty. Just as the feed goes back to real time, the team descends upon them.

Afterwards, Tony is teasing McGee about having at one point called him boss during the investigation. But McGee and Abby then move onto teasing him about how he got his great idea to loop the video, what movie was that from. They let Ziva try and figure it out. Upstairs Jen and Gibbs are talking about how Kody’s mom testified against a Colombian drug lord and it had come back to haunt her, she had to go on the run. Gibbs insists they try and find her. Jenny say no… and opens the door, to reveal a very tearful family reunion, it's already done.

We never get told how Jenny has achieved it; she herself says to Gibbs she is glad she can still surprise him, which is indeed an indication that we are used to seeing events (roughly) from the point of view of what the team itself knows.

New Character Development / Insights:
  • Ziva's view of the world allows her to see Kody as a potentially well trained terrorist, and she would not have hesitated to give the kill order. However, when it becomes evident that Kody is being used, she ungrudgingly tells Tony that his decision was the right one and becomes adamant that Kody not be harmed.
  • Despite Tony's general desire to supervise work, rather than participate in it, he can't stand not having anything to do.
  • Jenny wants to rush to Gibbs' defense. “Gibbs was my partner for a long time I can't just sit here and do nothing.”
  • Gibbs has had some hostage negotiation experience in the past.
  • As Jenny points out, Gibbs has rubbed off on Tony.
  • Tony does well as a boss and handles the situation much like Gibbs would, even to the point of telling the Director off so he can get the job done.
Funny Moments:
  • McGee accidentally calling Tony "boss," and everyone's reactions.
  • McGee’s less than stealthy squeaky shoes.
  • Tony's regret at saying “He always had an attitude problem” about Gibbs.
  • Abby waiting for McGee to hit her.
  • WWGD (what would Gibbs do)
  • When Kody says to frisk frisk him, "just like on Cops," Gibbs grins.
  • Abby and McGee pretending they don’t know which movie Tony’s big idea came from.
  • Ziva trying to remember Sandra Bullock's name.
  • The escalating level of violence in the lab, ending with Tony overhearing some scuffling noises: Tony: What the hell was that? Abby: Uh, McGee tripped.
  • McGee's shoe's and Ziva's reaction.
  • McGee hitting Abby and then running away.
  • Abby telling McGee to hit her but he refuses so she calls him Elf Lord. Leading to Ducky hearing Abby yell from outside the lab.
  • Ziva popping up on the computer screen near the end and pointing her gun at the webcam.
Trivia:
  • Gibbs uses ASL to tell Abby what's going on inside the school room so she can communicate to the rest of the team, without raising suspicions.
  • The green and white shirt Cynthia wears, is the same shirt that Kate wore in the episode "Lt. Jane Doe" Cynthia has a jacket on so you almost have to freeze the screen to see it. But it's the same.
  • The song playing at the beginning of the episode is "Lights Out" by P.O.D.
  • When Kody says the deadline is sunset, Gibbs asks if he means nautical, civilian or astronomical. The actual term is "civil twilight."There are three kinds of twilight defined: civil twilight, nautical twilight, and astronomical twilight. For computational purposes, civil twilight begins before sunrise and ends after sunset when the geometric zenith distance of the center of the Sun is 96 degrees - 6 degrees below a horizontal plane. The corresponding solar zenith distances for nautical and astronomical twilight are 102 and 108 degrees, respectively. That is, at the dark limit of nautical twilight, the center of the Sun is geometrically 12 degrees below a horizontal plane; and at the dark limit of astronomical twilight, the center of the Sun is geometrically 18 degrees below a horizontal plane. (Courtesy of US Navy.)
  • Michael Welsh plays the brother of Joan aka "Luke Girardi" in 45 episodes of "Joan of Arcadia". He is also known for guest starring in "Stargate SG-1", as a young clone of Jack O'Neill in Episode 7x3. He had additional guest starring in "Pretender", "X-Files", "The District", "CSI Las Vegas", "Crossing Jordan" and"Numb3rs". He also plays Mike Newton in the movie Twilight.
  • Jade Carter as "Marine Capt. Daniel Wise" played Harm's brother Sergei in 12 episodes of "JAG".


Recurring Cast:
    Guest Starring:
        • Stephanie Mello (NCIS Tech Cynthia Sumner)
        • Paul Schulze (Marine Major Ken Meyers)
        • Mauricio Mendoza (Rico Caldas)
        • Ruth Zalduondo (Angela Meyers)
        • Charles S. Kim (SRT Sniper)
        • Michael Welch (Kody Meyers)
        • Jade Carter (Marine Capt. Daniel Wise)
        • Linsey Godfrey (Stephanie Phillips)
        • Charles Duckworth (Joe Bennes)
        • Alexandra Krosney (Nadia Harcourt)
        Written By: Directed By:
        • Laurence Welsh
        • Terrence O'Hara




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