2.22: "SWAK"

by Sammie

"You take a cup of hot sake, you drop it in a beer, you toss it back, and..." Two guesses as to who says that. Hey. You didn't even need the second guess.

Sake-bombing is Tony's solution to Kate's cold. She wants to stick to her honey and hot tea; neither she nor McGee have been sake-bombing and neither intend to. When Gibbs finds out about the cold, Kate reassures him that she will sneeze into her tissues...unlike Tony. EW. Guess Tony's ma was too busy fixing his canopy bed and lighting candles to teach him about tissues. Gross.

Gibbs has never been sick - no cold, allergies, flu, nothing. "If you were a bug, would you attack Gibbs?" Tony's on to something.

There's a letter with a lip print and doused in perfume, and Tony assumes it's for him - OF COURSE. He told us in "Engima" he's started giving out his work address because he's got a crazy stalker ex-girlfriend. For those wondering why he blows at the envelope (I couldn't figure out why), some people do that to loose the letter from the envelope - so they say - and WHOOOOSH. It's snowing anthrax...or baby powder.

They're all showering, scrubbing down while their clothes are being burned. Tony's expensive Italian clothes are being roasted - see, yet another reason not to wear stuff like that. McGee points out the powder doesn't have to be anthrax: "...it could be smallpox, bubonic plague, cholera... ... ...foot powder, face powder, talcum powder...."

Kate seems unsurprised that Tony knows about honey dust, and unsurprised that McGee doesn't: "Yeah, that's because your mother raised you to respect women, McGee." All three, though, are shocked when they discover Gibbs knows what it is. Seems Tony gave his boss a case of Jack Daniels and some poor girl honey dust, and the two got mixed up in the mail. Tony banks his hopes on the fact that mail is all irradiated.

Kate defends McGee over the letter business; Tony did snatch it out of McGee's hands. Gibbs wants to leave the negative-pressure autopsy lab to find out who sent the letter. He said he's been scrubbed, sanitized...for all I know, sterilized."

The medical personnel come to get Tony, and Kate sneezes. Gibbs tells her to play it safe and makes her go to the hospital. (HA. Like he ought to have any say in the matter...hypocrite.) She's up in arms in an instant at the thought of having to stay in isolation with Tony; he, of course, raunch-izes it and talks about that crease when beds are pushed together - and gets a huge whack in the head from Gibbs for that.

They talk to Abby about the powder, and Palmer can't follow her logic. McGee explains, "Her mind operates like a pachinko machine."

Hey, it's Steven Eckholdt. He's Dr. Brad Pitt...cute. He makes a crack about Angelina Jolie, and Kate laughs at it, and Tony protests, "If I said what he said, you'd..." sharp elbow to Tony's chest "...elbow me." That's right.

Lt. Emma Ingham is their nurse, and she laughs at one of Tony's jokes; Kate's reply? "Oh, you don't want to encourage him." Poor Tony - he's got it tough around Kate. Kate and the doc are now on first name basis. Tony makes another crack about Kate, and Kate begs Brad Pitt to put Tony to sleep.

Poor Gibbs! He got a "Dear John" once? Little witch. And Gibbs, hon, you better stop picking your women and let someone else do it for you. Three crazy wives, that redhead in "My Other Left Foot" who...YOU KNOW...with her half-brother, that killer blonde who put on the dumb act Gibbs fell for in "Doppelgänger". Oh, wait. Ducky introduced him to wife #3, so he says in "The Bone Yard". Gibbs is out of serious luck.

It's old-style letter with calligraphy...and it says it contains Y. Pestis, the plague. The writer promises an antidote when the results of a certain case are revealed. Gibbs is so pissed he and McGee leave autopsy dressed in those blue CDC-looking suits (so they're still in isolation) and come up to Abby's lab.

Tony feels like "the King of Cool" - Kate asks, "Elvis?" Ok, even I knew it wasn't ELVIS. She's almost as bad as Gibbs. He starts going on about a movie, and Kate is tired of it already.

KATE. Could we just make a pact? Until we're out, I won't make fun of all the stupid things you say, and you won't tell me any more film scenarios. Deal?
TONY. Deal. ... Emma. ... You may find this of interest. You look pretty without the mask, by the way.

Gibbs has Abby pull all the tapes from the night previous.

ABBY. You got to get a life, Gibbs.
GIBBS. Last thing I need is another wife.

The case file mentioned in the SWAK letter is a rape case of a girl supposedly by firsties - new grads from Annapolis. All the firsties were cleared by a DNA test, so Pacci closed it and declared it a cold case. Told ya. Sucks to be Pacci. EVERYTHING that is never solved was never solved by him. Cassie Yates, his probie at the time, is called to HQ.

Kate is taking the matter calmly but almost helplessly. They can't do anything but sit and wait, and Tony won't shut up. She is sure he's afraid, and Tony does the macho thing and objects - she's never seen him afraid. "Well, not when the danger's something that we can confront." He points out she's afraid, and she agrees - "Anyone with half a brain [would be scared]. I take that back. You're not afraid."

Dr. Pitt comes to Lt. Ingham and informs her that everyone is negative for Y. Pestis - except Tony.

Problemo #2, there are TWO SWAKs on the letter; one on the outside and one on the inside, plus a moisture strip. Turns out it's Y. Pestis, or bubonic plague. It was kept alive with the moisture slip. The irradiation didn't kill it because it was protected on both sides by SWAKs - which were made with lipstick over 70% lead. Plus it's been altered to withstand antibiotics. Tony's in a small spot of trouble.

Pitt and Tony bond over a football game they both played in back in college. Kate groans - they're going to bong beers soon. "[Tony] epitomizes sophomoric." Lt. Ingham informs her quietly that Tony is infected and she is not.

Kate acts angry - most likely from worry and Tony's cavalier attitude - and lies to him, saying she's infected too (so she can stay in isolation with him). Tony instantly apologizes and feels bad. When Kate says he's going to be even sorrier, Tony's first assumption, interestingly, is that Gibbs is sick, too. Nope...Kate is going to make him miserable.

Cassie Yates has arrived, and she takes over McGee's spot at the computer and they work on the case. Since the victim had traumatic amnesia, it was her mother who accused the midshipmen staying at the hotel. She was "more famous than Hanoi Jane," according to Ducky, for that picture of her at a Vietnam War protest. Now? She heads up on the biggest biochemical companies in the world...with the capability to alter the plague virus to make it antibiotic-resistant.

Gibbs is taking Cassie with him to meet the mother; he sends Ducky to the hospital to check on Tony and find out why Kate hasn't returned.

At the hospital, Pitt is having qualms about letting Kate stay. Ducky already knows she's not infected. About her staying, though, "Ducky will understand. Gibbs will be the problem." The only reason I can think of is Gibbs is the type who says, "OK for me, not OK for you" as applied to every dangerous thing from not wearing Kevlar vests to getting married to wacko women. If Gibbs were in Kate's place, I bet he'd stay (if he could be sure someone was pummeling the guy who sent the plague) - he told McGee earlier that he should have given the envelope to him, not to Tony.

I think it's sweet of Kate to stay. Half the time I want to kill my brother, too, and he bugs the @#$^ out of me, but if he were infected, I'd want to stay, and I'd cry if I thought he were dying.

Tony knows now he's infected, but in typical sweet Tony fashion, tries to keep the tone light.

Cassie and Gibbs arrive at the mother's biomedical company.

CASSIE. How do you want to handle this?
GIBBS. The subtle approach. You serve the warrant. I'll shove my Sig in her face.

The woman is convinced her daughter was raped by a midshipman and accuses NCIS of lying to protect the Naval Academy. Gibbs goes down to the lab of the doctor who created the virus - only problem? "I developed a vaccine, not an antidote. It's of no use once the victim is infected." But there is a suicide chain - the Y. Pestis he made resistant to antibiotics (in order to make the vaccine) he also designed to kill itself after after 32 hours as a safety measure. But the victim will be no better off than the plague victims of the Middle Ages. As for the mother, Hanna Lowell? Her brain tumor is making her nuts.

Tony apologizes for teasing Kate about the movie references, and Pitt makes Kate leave. Ducky hugs her as she cries, thinking Tony is going to die. Gibbs strides right past them and past the doctor to talk to Tony, ordering him not to die. In typical Gibbs "macho man" fashion, his "comfort" to Tony is putting his new NCIS-issue cell phone into his hand and say, "It's your new cell. I'd get the number changed. Women keep calling for "Spanky." So very, very Gibbs-like!

Kate makes the decision to stay the night in isolation with Tony.

HIGHLIGHT BETWEEN THE ~ FOR THE ENDING TO THE COLD CASE: ~ Hanna Lowell has gone bonafide bonkers, and her daughter Sara, the one who was raped, is at the hospital waiting for her mother. We find out that Sara was NEVER ACTUALLY RAPED.... She was with her boyfriend, who jokingly tied her to the bed while he went out to buy them dinner because she'd joked about how cute the midshipmen looked in their uniforms. Boyfriend was killed in a hit-and-run...and since it looked terrible, her tied to her bed for two days, she made up the story about the rape. A whole group of sailors were falsely accused and Tony ALMOST DIED! for a lie done out of embarrassment! ~
 

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Crazy Credits

• We are clued in to the effect of the brain tumor on Hannah Lowell before Gibbs even confronts Dr. Pandy. Lowell says she hopes someone was infected by the Y. pestis she sent to NCIS - and she hopes it was "Westmoreland," the late US general in charge of the Vietnam war and who was most certainly NOT at NCIS.

• from article Honey Powder Mentioned on TV Increases Sales By 500%:
  "GreenDragonHerbals.com started receiving sales for honey powder within two hours of Tuesday Night's NCIS episode.

  "As avid viewers of NCIS, we were pleasantly surprised to find them mentioning one of our top products on their show. We greatly appreciate the mention, but we never expected the massive influx of new customers." says Judy Roberts, owner of GreenDragonHerbals.com."

• Steven Eckholdt (Cmdr. Dr. Brad Pitt) is credited with Harmon in "And Never Let Her Go".

• Olivia Burnette(Sarah Lowell) appeared as Katherine "Katie" Beckett, Sam Beckett's sister, on DPB's series "Quantum Leap." (She also guest starred in a different role on the series earlier.)

• from Harriet:
  • At the hospital, Gibbs passes a man talking with a nurse and turns around to look at him. The man was Mr. Bellisario himself.

    I have a feeling...that scene was something arranged between Dennis Smith ("my" director, since he "discovered" me for "Forced Entry" and why aren't they showing that episode again and again?) and Mr. B, who, after all, wrote the episode. I assume Mark didn't know it was going to happen much before the scene was shot and his sudden double-take wasn't so sudden, just good acting, as you noted.

  • How can the writers get away with referencing that many movies and using "Brad Pitt" as a character name?
    Every script is sent to a company hired by the studio (in our case, Paramount...in the old days, at Universal, there was a department on the lot called Research...I remember them well, and it was a sad day when they left...but that's another story for another day).

    Okay, so this company reads the script, and researches every reference, and every name, too. A long memo is sent back to the production, with notations of what did not clear. The rule of thumb used to be (probably still is) that at least three names or none have to be listed in the phone book (this was before the Internet yet) for the city referenced in order to "clear." In this case, the character's name was Doctor Brad Pitt, and more to the point, he said he was not the actor. And he did not do or say anything derogatory. (I'm sure there was more to it, but Legal Clearance is a four-year course; this is just the tip of the iceberg).

    As for references to movies and actors, these were casual and obviously acceptable.