"Good morning, ladies." I walk in with my usual cup of chai tea in my hand. Tony responds with a raised brow. "I stand by what I said." He rolls his eyes.

"Eva, we have a question for you." Kate approaches me abruptly.

I just drop my things at my desk. "I'm all yours."

"When you're dating," Tony grabs me by the shoulders, "isn't there always a phony breakup that precedes the real breakup?"

"Uh. . ." I look between the two, completely confused as to where this conversation is going. "Sure?"

Tony laughs triumphantly while Kate pinches the bridge of her nose.

"That is why I like you much more." He boops me on the nose.

"Yeah, got it. Thanks." Gibbs pushes past Kate. "Grab your gear. Kate, get Ducky. Tony, gas the truck. Eva, drink up." He leaves just as quickly as he enters.

"Where we going?"

"With Gibbs, you never know."

The crime scene is under a full lockdown with intense security. They wouldn't let me, Kate, and Tony in even after clearing Gibbs.

"Oh, what an awful way to die." Kate stares up at the top of the cliff where our dead Marine fell from.

Tony and I stare up as well. "I can think of worse ways to go."

"Other than falling to your death?" I shoot him a glance.

"Getting eaten by a shark, being buried alive, falling into a wood chipper." Tony lists out.

"You've clearly given this some thought."

"Well, yeah. So?"

"Nothing, Tony. Absolutely nothing."

"DiNozzo, Eva!" Gibbs calls out aggressively. "Top of the cliff. Shoot and sketch."

"Gee, boss. It's a long way up." Tony responds, trying to tone down his anxiety.

"DiNozzo, was there something in my tone of voice that made that sound like a suggestion?" Looks like there's no getting out of this one.

I trek forward, Tony trailing behind me quickly. "We just had to talk about falling off a cliff, didn't we?"

As we go up, some of the debris starts falling off the edges of the cliff. Tony and I stay close to the inner part of the cliff, not in the mood to die.

"It's okay. Everything's going to be fine." I don't know if Tony's talking to me or himself.

One particular step leads to a lot more rocks toppling over, startling both of us. I stop in my step, but Tony accidentally bumps into me and knocks me forward.

But he catches by my waist, pulling me back quickly. "I've got you."

My back is pressed flush against his chest. Breathing heavily, we pause for a few moments.

"Thanks." I gulp nervously, peering down at what could have been my last view.

Soon, once we're done with the whole cliff sketch, we head back to headquarters. Kate, Abby, and I talk about pushy men, and Tony and Gibbs visit Autopsy.

"This never ceases to amaze me." Abby and I watch the vapor fill the locked cabinet where the two pieces of the D-link sit.

"Care to take a look?" She hands me a second pair of red glasses.

Nodding my head excitedly, I slip them on. "Obviously."

When she turns on the blacklight, we watch fingerprints magically glow on the D-link.

"Any prints besides Lieutenant Johnson's?" Gibbs looks away from the giant monitor on the wall.

She stands beside him. "Uh, I got a partial that isn't his."

"Run it through AFIS and any other database you can think of."

"Done and done."

"What else you got for me, Abbs?" We join me and Tony at the table.

Abby uses some fancy forensic terminology that no one other than herself understands. But she finally reveals the news.

Our murderer made a very weak D-link and swapped it with Lieutenant Johnson's original one.

The next morning, the four of us visit Rick Johnson's home. After talking to his wife Denise, we split up to look around the house.

"Huh." I tilt my head to the side, frowning at the pillow and blankets set up beside the couch. "Hey, Kate, would you —"

And little miss Special Agent Kate is busy smiling from ear to ear while talking it up with a guy.

"Yo, Todd." She snaps back instantly. "We got work to do."

"Give me a second."

Next, we go to the base to meet with Commander Rainier again.

"Who had access to your climbing gear?" Gibbs takes the lead, walking alongside the commander with the rest of us following behind.

"That depends," Rainier speaks up. "Lines and harnesses are usually kept in a rope locker."

Tony adjusts his sunglasses. "What about D-links?"

"Not a controlled item. Most of my men take their personal gear like that home with them."

"Anyone in the unit could have had access to Johnson's?"

"I suppose so."

One thing's for sure, Commander Rainier still believes Johnson's death was an accident.

"How many men in your unit, Commander?"

Rainier halts, turning around to face us.

"That information's classified, Agent Gibbs." Someone shouts his name. "I'll be right back." With that, he walks away.

"That kind of ammo could take out an entire country." I nod at the back of the loading truck, full of stacked boxes.

As they begin to load the boxes into the crate, Commander Rainier returns. "I appreciate that you have a job to do. As far as we're concerned, this was a training accident."

"What if I was to tell you it wasn't?" Gibbs challenges, pulling out the snapped D-link.

"I was there, Agent Gibbs." He still isn't convinced. "I saw Johnson's D-link. It was broken."

"What you saw," Gibbs twists the broken piece between his fingers, "was a fake."

"Lieutenant Johnson's D-link was swapped."

"With one made from inferior metal."

"Metal that was designed to fail."

That seems to persuade Rainier as he assigns us security badges to gain access into the mission. And we've got 38 hours to find the killer. Otherwise, the mission will be scrubbed.

"Tony, Eva, get with whoever's in charge of the climbing gear. I want every rope, D-link, and harness checked." Gibbs calls out.

"You got it, boss." Tony and I share a glance with each other.

"I'll escort Agents DiNozzo and Giudice. Bravo team's bunked in here." Folsom holds open the door for Kate and Gibbs.

By the time we reach the NCIS building, it's already dark, and we still have a giant box of evidence to look through.

"Lieutenant Johnson's last two calls were made while in isolation." Kate clicks through his cellphone. "Both were to Father Clanon." She looks up.

I roll my eyes. "Of course you would recognize his number." In response, she nudges my arm.

"The lieutenant writes up Vengal for calling his pregnant wife during lockdown then makes two calls himself?" Gibbs brings up. "It doesn't make sense."

"Agent Gibbs." We look back to see an NCIS agent escorting another man. "Agent Kramer, CIA. Is there someplace we can talk?"

"Yeah." Gibbs dismisses the agent. "How about right here?" He offers. "Whatever you say to me, you can say to my team."

Kramer basically tells us that there's a very high chance our killer is smart and clever, as well as a part of the task force team.

Abby reports back with a match on the partial print she found on the broken D-link.

A print belonging to the one and only Denise Johnson. Another visit later, and we're right back where we started.

"Here's a page thirteen Lieutenant Johnson wrote after Petty Officer Vengal got into a fight in town." Tony pulls up the document on his computer. "He said he didn't start the fight, he was just protecting himself."

"It's not in Vengal's service report." Kate flips through the papers.

I peer over Tony's shoulder. "That's not the only thing. We've got an undated Fitness Report here."

"Under comments, Lieutenant Johnson wrote: 'Though Petty Officer Vengal is an outstanding sailor and no doubt will make a fine Petty Officer First Class, at this point I think he needs a little seasoning and I am not recommending him for promotion'." Tony reads off an excerpt.

"Ouch."

"Also not in his service report."

"So," Tony rests his elbows on the edge of his desk, "how can that be?"

"Rainier said Johnson rode Vengal pretty hard. My guess is that was part of his carrot and stick approach." Gibbs declares his theory. "He wrote the page thirteen, showed it to Vengal."

"But never formally filed it."

"So if the guy never cleaned up his act, Johnson would toss the page thirteen like it never existed."

"But what about that counseling sheet he wrote up when Vengal showed up late?" I speak up.

"Just a slap on the wrist. Page thirteen's a lot more serious."

Tony and I leave to pick up Vengal seeing as he lied to Johnson about his whereabouts.

And because of my stupid mouth, I land myself in a reenactment exercise as to how Lieutenant Johnson fell.

"You better hope you can run fast because your ass is mine when I get down from here." I glare down at Tony from the top of the lift.

I cling to the rails for dear life, trying not to look down at what could be my fall to death. Gibbs hooks me up, and I freefall down.

"Could I, uh, do that again?" I scratch the back of my neck. "You know, for, um, learning purposes. So we can get a better feel for what happened."

"Looks like someone broke out of their shell."

Tony pulls me forward by the D-link, his eyes never leaving mine as he unstraps me.

"Hold on a second." I run to the desk, picking up the snapped D-link. "This one is way lighter than an actual D-link. If Lieutenant Johnson was an expert climber, how wasn't he able to tell the difference?"

Gibbs pauses for a moment. "Get changed. We have less than an hour."

Johnson committed suicide. He had been having an affair with another man and felt guilty after his wife confronted him.

"So, you mentioned something about my ass belonging to you?"

"Shut up, DiNozzo."