Callen and Sam quickly ducked away when they saw the gun and grabbed their own guns. They shot back whenever they could. After a minute or so the bad guy was down and Sam and Callen moved in. The man was dead. Callen and Sam moved into the house and searched the entire house but there was no one else. Callen took a pic with his phone of the dead man's face and sent it to Eric.
"Eric, incoming pic, need an ID," Callen spoke through the coms.
"On it."
"Was there anything at the house Mr. Callen?" Hetty's voice was heard through the com.
"There's nobody else at this house and our only lead is dead. We'll look through the house to see if we can find any plans but it seems like there's not much here," Callen replied.
"Got an ID on your dead man," Eric interjected. "His name is David James, US citizen, he's a former marine. Dishonorably discharged two months ago."
"What for?" Sam asked.
"It doesn't say."
"Where was he stationed?"
"Three guesses," Eric said.
"Camp Pendleton."
"Ding, ding ding, you're moving onto the bonus round."
"That's no coincidence," Callen started. "He worked at Camp Pendleton, he must have known about these sort of things. The question is, is he involved or did they use him as a scape goat."
"Good question indeed, Mr. Callen. I'll have Ms. Blye and Mr. Deeks speak to his commanding officer."
Callen and Sam went to look through the house, but there were no plans or anything to be found. It looked like they set up James as bait with the truck here. Perhaps all James was to the others was collateral damage. Nell found out that James had a family living a few blocks from this address. Callen and Sam were on their way over there now.
Callen and Sam made their way over the front door and Callen knocked on the door. A little later a woman in her thirties opened the door.
"Mrs. James?" Sam asked.
"Yeah, who are you?"
"I'm special agent Sam Hanna, this is my partner special agent Callen. We're with NCIS," Sam spoke as he and Callen showed their ID's.
"NCIS? My husband is not in service anymore. If you're looking for him he's not here."
"We're not here to talk to your husband. We're here to talk to you."
"Me why?"
"Would it be okay if we came in?" Sam asked, not wanting to tell her everything on her doorstep.
"No, not until you tell me what's going on," she spoke while crossing her arms across on her chest.
"We're sorry to tell you but your husband was killed this morning."
"What no, that can't be, he's not in the navy anymore," Mrs. James spoke, starting to cry.
"We're very sorry ma'am, perhaps it's better if we discuss this further inside."
Mrs. James nodded and let Callen and Sam into the living room.
"What happened?" Mrs. James managed to speak.
"This morning a truck carrying weapons for our armed forces was robbed," Sam started to explain. "The truck that was used in the robbery was tracked to a house. During a shootout your husband was killed."
"No, that can't be. David wouldn't do something like this and he definitely wouldn't shoot at law enforcement. No, this can't be, there must be another reason for this."
"I'm sorry Ma'am, but it looks like your husband was part of this robbery."
"No, he wouldn't never do this," Mrs. James yelled. "Yeah of course he had trouble after he was let go by the navy. But he would never do something like this. This just can't be."
"Was your husband in any kind of trouble after getting out?" Callen asked.
"No, he was a good man. He just did a stupid thing while in service and that got him kicked out but he's a good man. But ever since he got out he did have some trouble finding a job, he was a bit depressed about it but he wouldn't go do something like this."
"Do you know where he was early this morning?"
"He left early to speak with someone about a new job. He said not to worry that he was certain he would get this job and that it would pay good. But he would never do something like this. This not him."
"We still don't know all that happened, we're just trying to figure out what happened," Sam said. "Do you have any idea why he would be involved with something like this? Was he in trouble with someone or did someone threaten him or you?"
"No, not that I know at least. He was acting as usual as ever. He wouldn't just do something like this, I know my husband."
"Again we're very sorry for your loss ma'am. If you can think of anything please let us know," Sam spoke and gave her his card.
"Thank you, please find out what happened."
Callen and Sam left and went back to the office. Kensi and Deeks had come back from the boatshed as well.
"Anything of James' former commanding officer?" Callen asked.
"No, not much. He was an upstanding sailor before going off the rails. They had no choice but to let him go," Kensi answered.
"Did he tell you why James was discharged?" Sam asked.
"He didn't get into specifics but it was nothing that would indicate him doing this."
"We may have something new," Nell spoke as she and Eric walked into the bullpen.
"We looked more into the house and security cams in the area," Eric started. "The house has been vacant for a few months now but it was previously owned by a company. But that turned out to be a shell company of a shell company. But after some digging we found it. The house was previously owned by a company run by this man," Eric spoke and he put a picture up on the screen. "This is Carlos Sanchez. He is wanted for a number of things but no agency has ever found anything that could stick."
"What's the connection between him and James?" Deeks asked.
"It took some digging," Nell continued. "But we were able to find a few encrypted text messages on James' burner phone. It was with a right hand man of Sanchez, his cousin Fernando. After we encrypted them, these are some of the texts that stood out to us."
Nell put a few pictures on the screen.
"You're gonna help us otherwise is will end badly for you," Callen read one.
"We know where you live and will kill your wife if you don't do as we say," Kensi read another.
"So he was being threatened," Sam stated.
"Send a team of agents to watch James' house. If Sanchez gets word James has been killed they might go after his wife," Callen ordered.
"How did Sanchez find him?" Deeks asked.
"We can't say for curtain," Eric answered. "But it could have to do with James' last mission. His mission was in Mexico, near the suspected base of operations of Sanchez. There are not many details of that mission but it could be that first contact was made there."
"Guess we better talk to James' former CO again," Callen said to Sam.
They had James' former CO brought to the boatshed again and Callen and Sam questioned him.
"I told your colleagues everything I know already," CO Brooks said.
"New information has come to light about James and his last mission for you in Mexico," Callen spoke.
"What about that mission?"
"We have reason to believe that Carlos Sanchez is behind this and your last mission in Mexico was awfully close to his suspected base of operations," Sam told Brooks. "What really happened on that mission and why was James discharged?"
Brooks sighed. "There's truth to what you're saying. Our last mission was about gathering intel on Carlos Sanchez and his cartel. I can't share all the details with you but we found evidence that James had gone off mission. We saw him meeting with one of Sanchez's men. At first we thought he had a CI, but it went deeper than that so we discharged him. We were still trying to make a case when he was killed."
"You think he was in with the Sanchez cartel?" Callen asked.
"That's what we're trying to find out. That's why I couldn't tell you guys anything, we're still investigating."
"We'll it's our investigation now. A bunch of weapons have been stolen, probably by Sanchez's cartel. I don't have to tell you how dangerous those weapons can be in enemy hands."
"No you don't agent Callen. I'll do anything I can to help."
"You can help by giving us all the information about the Sanchez cartel," Sam demanded.
"Of course, I have it here," Brooks replied and gave Callen a flash drive. "James was a good man, a good sailor. I have no idea why he would do this. Please keep me in the loop if you find something."
"Will do."
Callen and Sam went back to the office and Callen handed the flash drive to Eric and Nell. About an hour later Nell and Eric called the team up to OPS.
"Combined with the information we got from Brooks and what we found on James' burner phone," Eric started. "We were able to find a hideout just across the border in Mexico. It's listed under the same shell company as the house we found James in. The place has top of the notch security and a close network so we can't hack any cameras. But we do have a drone in the area and we just got the images of the compound."
Eric put several pictures on the screen. They saw the heavily guarded compound and a truck standing in the driveway. It was a bit hard to make out from this distance but it definitely looked like the truck that was carrying the weapons, except with a new paint color. They saw men unloading crates from the truck. According to the manifest those resembled the crates perfectly from the Camp Pendleton shipment.
"How fast can we get to Mexico?" Sam asked.
"A chopper is already waiting for you all Mr. Hanna," Hetty spoke as she walked into OPS. "And a team of marines will meet you in Mexico. Chopper leaves in five minutes."
They all grabbed their go bags and went to the chopper. About an hour later they arrived at the place the marines were meeting them.
"Agent Callen, NCIS," Callen greeted the one in charge of the team.
"Master Chief Hayes. We patrolled the area and found a point of entry."
The Master Chief explained the plan to the NCIS agents with a map of the compound. Callen and Sam went with a few of the marines and Kensi and Deeks went with the others. They each took a side of the compound. They had oscillating cameras with a narrow window to get through. The techs of the marines were watching the cameras and would call out the window over the earpiece, Eric and Nell were on the same frequency as well in OPS. Some of the marines were wearing cameras so they could watch the op from OPS as well. They went with teams of two each time, otherwise the window was too narrow. They sat covered behind some rocks waiting for the countdown. When the time was right they each ran towards the wall of the compound. The first one there shot some sort of bug on the camera so they could hack into the feed. Eric hacked the feed and put the cameras on a loop and disabled the motion sensors. When everyone was at the wall they each went up and over the wall. They had a perfect spot with some thick bushes they could hide behind. When they were all over the wall they took their positions with the rifles ready. They had made a plan who would take which guard.
"On three everyone take the shot, one, two, three," Hayes counted down and everyone took their shot, taking the guards down.
When the coast was clear they made their way into the house where they came across some more guards. They shot them. Callen saw Sanchez making a run for it so he went after him with Sam and a marine hot on his tail. Callen hardly had time to react when Sanchez turned around with his gun drawn. Callen shot at Sanchez but not before Sanchez had fired a shot at Callen.
Up in OPS they were watching the footage. The marine that ran after Callen and Sam wore a camera on his vest and up in OPS they saw what happened. Sanchez turning around and shooting at Callen. They saw Sanchez go down from Callen's shot and after that from Sam's shot as well but they also saw Callen going down.