When an internal breach forces NCIS to go into lockdown mode, a miniature hi-tech computer chip found in SecNav Porter's pen is revealed as the bug. Gibbs gives Porter the benefit of the doubt and the team meets with NSA Analyst Ellie Bishop, the author of a previous NSA report predicting the breach. Someone posing as an agent steals another spy pen found on the dead body of a government contracted employee and they soon believe the perpetrator's intention is to extort NCIS for money in exchange for returning the intel. Bishop suggests they deposit the money as a way to track the culprit and SecNav Porter approves the plan, but during the transaction, Ellie's fellow NSA agent is killed while attempting to tail the perpetrator. They suspect his killer is Rudolph Stalin, an American wanted for selling U.S. intel to Russia. Racked with guilt, Bishop realizes her colleague was lured and killed for proof to another buyer that his intel is genuine. The team tracks Stalin down and brings him into custody where Bishop pretends to be his lawyer to coerce information from him. After Stalin reveals a man named Edward Gracy is behind the the extortion and murder, the team locates him and learns he was mass sending the spy pens attached to charity flyers to every corporation except for Beringer Marine, the company paying him to do so. Gibbs tricks the CEO into disclosing his aim of embarrassing SecNav Porter as he believed she was not up to the job. After apprehending him, Gibbs asks Bishop to continue working with NCIS on a joint duty assignment.