assignment." tonight, nbc news goes "on assignment." >> i felt just like a gigantic piece of -- >> bleep it. >> matt lauer one on one with the most decorated olympic champ ever. >> i've never, ever heard you say the things you're saying right now. >> before olympics number five, michael phelps speaks out about the demons that plagued him. >> so this is a cry for help? >> i believe so, yeah. >> and how rehab saved him. >> i'm not hiding behind anything anymore. henry smith travels

thousands of miles to an enchanted land where tv news cameras have never been. >> we like to think of it as paradise lost and found. >> this place is teeming with life. it is on land, in the sea. >> shark coming in. >> could this magical spot hold the secret to help saving the planet? >> what's happening is really an sos signal. we have to do something. but first, richard engel with an nbc news investigation. the terrorist who grew up next door. >> can i talk to you for a minute? >> when did you learn he had actually gone to syria to join isis? >> right now. >> you didn't know until right now? >> americans who joined isis. tonight, we reveal their identities. >> there are 15 names here. >> an aspiring doctor, a valedictorian, her husband, their baby. how did these young americans become terrorists? >> beheadings of brutality. do you think the boy you grew up

with was capable of doing that kind of thing? >> yes, in an instant. >> the story right now "on assignment." welcome to "on assignment." i'm lester holt. we begin tonight with an nbc news investigation into the enemy within, americans who left this country to join isis. tonight, for the first time, we reveal who they are. richard engel reports. >> reporter: two months ago in this small border town in turkey, we met a man who said he was an isis defector. he handed us a thumb drive containing the details of thousands of isis fighters. it was an unprecedented treasure-trove of information since verified by u.s. government agencies. of all the thousands of names, we focused on 15 because they come from right here in the united states. these american isis fighters are for the most part the sons of immigrant parents who came to this country to find the

american dream and they did. their sons grew up in this country, went to school here, had friends and ambitions, but they left it all behind to join a terrorist group. why? are there more? and what did law enforcement miss? we asked retired fbi agent gomal to join our investigation. gomal spent much of his 20-year career tracking radical islamists. this is not the most sophisticated crime lab you have seen in the world, but these are the documents. >> reporter: the documents contain some clues about these young men. >> here's omar. >> omar katan was a student at the university of north texas. then he signed up to be a suicide attacker. this one went to high school in suburban minneapolis.

alberto, a convert to islam from gilroy, california, is seen here inside syria. >> the vast majority say i want to be a fighter, but this one says i want to be a suicide bomber, so he doesn't want to come back. >> but of all the names on the list, two americans stood out because they appeared to arrive in syria on the same day. jaffrey and rasel raihan. gomal suggested we start with one of their families. >> my theory was always was there is no way your kid would change from a normal person to a suicide bomber and no one notice any difference. >> on a small suburban street outside columbus, we found rasel's parents' home. can i talk to you for a minute? you don't want to talk to me? well, he clearly didn't want to speak. get lost was what he said. he said he was going to call the

police. >> reporter: off camera, rasel's father told us he brought his children from bangladesh 16 years ago and has at times worked two jobs to support the family. he says he hasn't heard from rasel in two years and disavows what he's done. our team tracked down this video of rasel. >> he is such an outgoing kid. >> phil chu was one of his best friends in high school. >> he was an exceptional student. >> he wanted to go to harvard? >> yes, he wanted to be a doctor. he wanted to help people. >> in this video, rasel comes across as a typical teen. smart and even a little geeky. >> we tried things like adding nutrients to things. >> but in his junior year, he started to slip. >> stopped showing up to class,

he was dodging class. >> then before graduation rasel disappeared. >> he was off the radar. he was gone. >> were you worried? >> of course, yeah. everyone was worried. >> then about a year later in november 2014, phil suddenly got a text message from rasel over skype. he's actually in syria. >> he's acting completely out of character. >> at one point he said, the fbi might come knocking on your door. >> yeah, i was like what the hell did you do. >> he joined a terrorist organization and was already in syria, but he didn't tell phil that. he did tell him who had guided him on his path. >> i hate to make assumptions, but i believe because that's what he specifically stated he talked to his sister. that's how he got into islam. >> so rasel had a sister. her name was zakia, and she clearly played a key role. her she is at 16 in an ohio

public television video. >> it's like harvest time. i really haven't had this kind of experience before. >> reporter: zakia was also a hard working, high achieving student. she graduated as a valedictorian, but a close friend of hers told us that she became increasingly religious, distant, and got married quickly soon after graduation. it turns out zakia was the missing link. it was her husband who traveled to syria with her little brother, rasel. a picture was starting to emerge. what seems to me most mysterious is this connection. how did zakia link up with jaffrey? >> reporter: so we headed to california, where jaffrey grew

up in an affluent home in palo alto. hello. i'm looking for mr. khan. are you mr. khan? i'm richard engel from nbc news. we've tried to call you a few times. could i talk to you for a minute? many of the family members we approached for this story didn't want to appear on camera for fear of a backlash. off camera, jaffrey's father, who came here from pakistan at a young age, told us what he says he told the fbi. he hasn't spoken to his son in nearly two years. we found this youtube video of jaffrey goofing around with his cousin. that cousin, ahmed, agreed to meet us.

ahmed says jaffrey was into rap music, marijuana, and the internet until he started watching propaganda videos. >> he was getting angry. he said we're surrounded by a bunch of sinful people and we should move to a muslim country. he was getting more angry, more hateful toward americans. >> it was around that time, ahmed says, that jaffrey met and quickly married zakia. >> how did they meet? >> on a dating, matrimonial website. >> the newlyweds settled in ohio, and she enrolled at ohio state university. of all places, they chose to move into this building where an al qaeda member christopher paul was arrested in 2007. paul is serving a long prison sentence for plotting attacks, but his wife lived right next door to zakia and jaffrey. we went to a nearby mosque where paul used to pray to see if anyone there now jaffrey, zakia, or rasel. >> i had met jaffrey. the other two i'm not familiar

with. >> omar khattab is the mosque's board president. there have been a number of people who have passed through these doors who have ended up being associated with extremist groups. >> there have been a few. >> how do you explain that? >> they weren't involved in the mosque too much. if someone wants to come and worship, they're welcome to. what they do outside of their own life is their own business. violence and terrorism are in contradiction to the direct teachings of islam. the fact they were living on the street concerns me. the fact they were attending in the mosque concerns me. >> did you miss something? >> i don't know. i don't think so. >> but clearly something was happening just down the street. a family was becoming a cell. rasel was spending more and more time with his sister zakia and her new husband jaffrey.

>> jaffrey brainwashed him into joining him as well. >> you think jaffrey was the one who made the younger brother extreme? >> definitely, yeah. >> the fbi got a tip warning that jaffrey might be mixed up with jihadist extremists. jaffrey and his wife traveled to kenya where they claimed to have lost their passports. according to his skype texts with phil, rasel was interviewed by fbi, and zakia and jaffrey were on the watch list for terrorism. >> jaffrey joined isis and he went overseas with his wife. then he also took her brother. so they all went to go fight, all three of them.

>> that was news to phil chu in columbus. when did you learn he had gone to syria to join isis? >> i didn't know about the isis part until today right now. >> you didn't know until right now? >> i didn't know until right now. he actually is? >> yes. >> what a damn shame. >> we later learned rasel who later took the name abu abdullah al amriki, the american, was killed. he was according to one family member in the wrong place at the wrong time. that would be syria in the age of isis. but zakia and jaffrey are said to be alive and well, working at this well-equipped hospital in raqqah, the capital of the so-called islamic state. ten months ago, they had this baby girl and named her miriam. >> you know what isis does. >> yeah. >> the beheadings and brutality. >> yeah, extreme. >> he heard jaffrey was present at a mass beheading of christians. do you think the boy you grew up with who became this man, is capable, was capable of doing that kind of thing? >> yes. if he talked about people who

are killing muslims, he'll do it in an instant. >> you don't think someone had a duty, you or others, had a duty to pick up the phone and tell someone this guy is talking about killing people, killing americans, that they deserve to die? no alarms went off? >> at the time, no. >> why didn't anyone else in the family pick up the phone? >> i personally believe they were scared or didn't care too much about him. >> in a written state, the family said jaffrey's actions and decisions have been heartbreaking and that we do not support his personal choices. off camera, jaffrey's mother told us she is in contact with him over encrypted text messages. >> as serious as the threat is here in the united states, it pales in comparison to the threat faced by even some of our closest western allies. >> john carlon is the assistant attorney general for national security.

>> we found a young man, jaffrey, who one of his acquaintances reported on him to the fbi. he attended a mosque where a former al qaeda member, who is now in jail, attended. he was known to his family members to becoming increasingly radical and dangerous. yet he managed to travel abroad multiple times. >> i'm not going to talk about particular cases here, but i think at the beginning of the threat we need to get better at disrupting those who would go travel overseas as foreign terrorist fighters. we need to work with communities to do everything we can to disrupt those who would go join this terrible group overseas and that might try to return here to commit attacks or to commit atrocities there. >> reporter: the fbi says it is seeing a drop in young men trying to go overseas and join isis.

but gomal says the threat will remain unless we take a smarter approach to counter the isis message. >> i think this is the tip of the iceberg. >> tip of the iceberg implies the isis problem in america is much bigger than we think it is. is that what you're saying? >> if it is not now, it will be bigger if we do not do something fast. >> i'm going to tell you right now people aren't going to like to hear that. >> it is my expert opinion. it is the fact that i believe in. coming up -- >> i feel like a high school kid again. >> swimmer michael phelps goes for olympics number five. tonight, the new father opens up about his own father. >> the feeling of being abandoned by my father, i was a kid that always wanted a family. >> a powerful conversation with matt lauer. >> the world will see me in a different way. don't let bad odors escape.

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michael phelps makes a splash with a surprise revelation. >> they had no idea? >> no one did. i almost got away with it. and harry smith takes the plunge into a water adventure of his own. >> shark coming in. you wonder what it is like to do something like this. amazing. >> the most magnificent paradise you've never seen. is made for e who do more than just vacation. ♪ whoa go with me now it's made for those who vacation like they mean it. universal orlando resort. atcreate your own seafood trios

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it's so unique it's become a laboratory for scientists. harry smith found their mission is nothing less than learning how to save the planet. >> reporter: we're in a place you've probably never heard of. this is the palmyra atoll where fish and birds and coral abound like few other places on the planet. living proof that left to its own devices nature can heal itself. we like to think of it as

paradise lost and found. there's about 1,000 miles of water between hawaii and palmyra. we loaded a plane with gear and with our guides from the nature conservancy, we headed south for a rare and exclusive look. going to paradise. the u.s. military used this as a base in world war ii and conveniently left a runway. the nature conservancy has a research station on palmyra and most of the time the only people here, a skeleton crew of four. dr. stephanie weir is a senior scientist with the nature conservancy. >> this is a place that is teeming with life. it is on land, on sea, in the air. there are thousands of birds nesting here. baby sharks swimming at our doorsteps.

you know, tripping over crabs. >> palmyra is a kind of petri dish of possibility. especially impressive because the entire atoll was flattened in world war ii to make room for 2,000 u.s. troops. yet here birds thrive, free to mate and raise their young because rats, a non-native species, were eradicated. a formidable undertaking. how important is this habitat to these birds? >> well, the birds need a habitat that is free of predators. there are no mammalian predators on palmyra, so they can breed to their hearts' content. >> do you ever get tired of just standing here and watching this unfold? >> never. never. it's a fantastic sight to see. >> reporter: palmyra is a

welcome place for all kinds of birds, red footed, masked, brown and blue boobies. truly a sanctuary. along the old world war ii landing strip, birds like to hang out on either side, including this bird. there are only 7,000 in the whole world. i talk to them. sometimes they talk back. [ whistling ] [ bird whistled ] what you get from a few days on palmyra is a clear understanding of the balance of nature, the interdependence and the symbiosis. where there is plenty of plankton, there are rays like these that came to visit us every night. this is u.s. territory and a cooperative effort of the department of the interior, the

u.s. fish and wildlife service, and the nature conservancy. palmyra is just one of a number of protected areas known as monuments in the pacific, totaling half a billion acres, of which susan white is the superintendent. huge, big swaths of the pacific that are protected. >> uh-huh. >> what does that mean, protected? >> it is protected so that they stay wild. we'll never have condominiums here. the critters have homes to live in without having to adapt too much to having people around them all the time. >> can we afford to have these monuments out in the middle of the pacific ocean where nothing and everything happens? >> yeah. well, the simple answer is i don't think we can afford not to. >> what does it mean for you to be here and to see how well this place is doing? >> yeah, it feeds my soul. it is a part of who i am, and i'm very -- you're going to make me cry. yeah.

very lucky. the best thing that we can have in life is to do something we believe in, that we're passionate about. bad tears. >> good tears. >> reporter: palmyra is a string of tiny islands surrounded by 16,000 acres of lagoons and coral reefs. reefs in australia have been decimated by climate change. concerned the same might be true here, we headed to sea with a zoologist and coral researcher with the nature conservancy. >> do you want to show me around a little bit? >> yeah, let's take a look at what's here. there are 170 different species of coral on palmyra. >> 170? >> yes indeed. >> reporter: there were spots of concern.

>> this is probably bleached. it's supposed to be healthy. >> so that's what's wrong at the great barrier reef, bleaching? >> yes. >> reporter: reefs bleach when water temperature gets warmer than normal, killing the coral. if global temperatures continue to rise, it will make it difficult for reefs to rebound. for as the reefs go, so do the oceans. oceans that feed us. oceans that breathe. because of its isolation and protection, palmyra's reefs are still in good shape. >> this is so peaceful. it is almost beyond your imagination. >> reporter: for where there's good healthy coral, there's lots of fish. fishing, by the way, is illegal within a 50-mile radius of palmyra. >> this is what is so cool about palmyra. we have a huge snapper and a reef shark just all cruising

through right in front of us all at the same time. >> i could get used to this. >> reef shark coming in. another black tip coming in off the left. >> sharks seem to want to keep an eye on us. >> we kind of stick out down here. we don't quite belong. >> we mean you no harm, sir. >> reporter: the sharks pose no threat to us. reef sharks no bigger than five feet or so, but let's be honest. they are so cool to see so close. >> this is your office. >> coming to work every day is not so bad when your office looks like this. >> reporter: palmyra is one of the last best places on earth, a reminder of how things could be, how they ought to be. >> one of the unique things about palmyra is its got a population of four, right? so there are very few places in

the world that you can access to study coral reef, where you can really minimize human impact. we can understand how a reef functions because we can eliminate all the confusion of what people create basically when they're living near a coral reef. we can see the coral reef more clearly here. >> it is like taking the static out of a radio signal. >> that is a perfect analogy. >> reporter: where there is no static, dr. weir hears a call for help. >> i think what is happening with coral reefs is an sos signal for the planet. think about it. what's happening right now, this global coral bleaching event is dramatic. to me, that's a coral screaming that we have to do something, right? there's very few systems that can give us this kind of visible, dramatic signal to point out how things are changing. >> reporter: as isolated as palmyra is, the evidence of human carelessness is

everywhere. trash on the beach that floats in from all over the pacific. >> here we are in the most perfect place left on the planet and there's this. >> right. >> there's crap like this all over this beach. >> how can this be? we're doing a really good job of putting a lot of crap in the ocean, and we have to stop. this is about all of us changing our behaviors and all of us getting involved. >> do you think you can do that? do you think you can actually get people to sort of change their behavior enough to bring the planet back to some semblance of nature? >> so my answer to that is, if i didn't, what the hell am i doing, right? i would be crazy. i would be crazy to be doing this if i did not think it was possible for us to do that. >> are you crazy? >> i don't know. i don't think so.

>> reporter: after three days here, we'd seen so much, but there was one more boat ride ahead to one of palmyra's most delicate spots. delicate spots. ♪ ♪ it's time to get seriously silly, people. ♪ join red nose day to do some serious good to help fight kids' poverty. ♪ it's simple: just get your red nose, only at walgreens, and get your silly on, seriously. walgreens. at the corner of happy and healthy. to twhat a good dealing looks like...

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and there's one more thing. with our time on palmyra almost up, we were afraid our last adventure would get washed out. then the sun came out, saving one of our most anticipated explorations. these are clothes i bought new in new york, then froze in a plastic bag, brought here because the place we're going so so sensitive, so restrictive, they want to make sure that we don't bring anything with us that could be invasive. clad in our once frozen clothes, we head to a place called the milky way. since there are no more rats in palmyra tiny fiddler crabs thrive here. why are these little fiddler crabs important in the big, big picture of things? >> these fiddler crabs are the energy source for the shore birds that fly all the way down

here from alaska, and they provide the food, the snickers bars, of the wilderness for those shore birds. >> reporter: it started to pour again. did we mention it rains 200 inches a year here? but no way were we going to miss the coconut crabs. >> take a look at this. in this whole ecosystem here, all of palmyra, why is this one place important? >> throughout the entire island we have the highest density of coconut crabs found anywhere on palmyra. they can be blue. they can be red. they look like a spider on ster yo oids, but they are docile and gentle. they are very slow moving. >> perhaps because some are down

right massive. >> how big is this thing? >> this is one of the few places in the world where coconut crabs are not harvested by humans. they are fully protected here at palmyra, which means they are able to live out their full life span and we know coconut crabs can live to be least 70 years old. >> reporter: no doubt they live a full, colorful life. >> is this paradise? >> you know, is this paradise? paradise, i'm not sure if paradise exists anymore. to be completely honest, there's really no place in the world that is untouched. to me, paradise is a place that is completely untouched. there's garbage on the beach. we've got impacts of climate change and sea level rise happening here, but this is pretty close. it's obviously beautiful, teeming with life. it's a place of inspiration. it's as close as you can find to paradise i think these days. >> coming up, candid, courageous.

>> i sent myself down a downward spiral. i had to get something under control. >> reporter: olympic champion michael phelps on his secret struggle. >> i've never, ever heard you say the things you are saying right now. right now. d let the fun fly! because angry birds are coming to mcdonald's. how ya doin'? isn't that cool? now you can order, scan and unlock in game rewards based on "the angry birds movie," rated pg only in theaters. ugh! the door, why didn't we think of that? of bad breath germs% for a 100% fresh mouth. with breath so fresh, it's no wonder listerine® users feel ready enough to be in a magician's act. kill 99% of bad breath germs. feel 100% in life. bring out the bold™ school lunch can be difficult. cafeteria chaos. one little struggle... can lead to one monumental mishap.

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18 gold medals, more than an athlete, michael phelps is a phenomenon and now he's a father. phelps and his fiance nicole just welcomed a son named boomer.

it is another life-changing event for the champ who's been through so many. tonight he opens up about a hard-fought victory not in the pool but in rehab. matt lauer joined him in arizona. >> i went in with no self confidence, no self love. >> i'm going to stop you there. it's going to be extraordinary for people at home thinking of the most decorated olympic athlete they've ever seen saying, i went in with no self-confidence. >> at that point in my life i felt like a giant piece of -- >> you can say it. i'll bleep it. >> that's what i felt like. i think the biggest thing was -- i thought of myself as just a swimmer and nobody else. >> he's won more olympic medals, 22, than anyone in history but for all of his conquests, michael phelps was privately dealing with inner demons. >> i don't know if it was afraid

of just letting go and showing who i am or what it was. i finally was just like screw this. i'm not hiding behind anything anymore. i am who i am. if you don't like it, it's really not my issue and it's not my problem. >> a new olympic record. >> reporter: most of the world first heard the name michael phelps at the 2004 athens games. >> michael phelps is far and away the biggest name of the games. >> reporter: and the year i first interviewed him in his career. to the 2012 london games. >> and it is the end of an era. >> reporter: london was supposed to be his olympic swan song as he told me back then. >> i'm done. i'm finished. i'm retired. i'm done. no more. >> reporter: we're now learning at the time phelps could barely stand swimming and his relationship with his coach bob bowman, someone he had trained

with since he was 11, was often toxic. >> prior to london, bob, was there ever a time you thought he wasn't going to go? >> yeah. i hoped he would. >> why? >> because i didn't want to go through this. i thought it was going to end really badly. >> reporter: bowman and phelps relationship had become like a dysfunctional married couple. the coach no longer wanted to deal with phelps defiant behavior, like missing practices, a lot of them just before london, a fact they kept hidden from the public. >> let's go back to the days before london. i was rather surprised to pick up a copy of "sports illustrated" magazine and there you are on the cover. it told a story in the magazine about how in the months leading up to london you and bob were not getting along all that well and one time in particular you had a brutal fight. >> there were a couple of them. >> he says, we go at it. world war iii. i smash my watch against the

wall, i peel out of the parking lot, i flip him the bird, and he flips me the bird. and he doesn't come back for ten days. this is leading up to london, in the prime of your training for the olympic games and you don't show up for ten days. what's going on? >> i didn't care. i honestly didn't care. >> he said he came back on day 11 because matt lauer was in town to interview him for "the today show." >> yeah. i had something to do. >> they had no idea that's what our preparation was like for london. >> no one did. that's why i say i almost got away with it. >> i remember talking to you about your training during that interview. you said it was going pretty well. >> yeah, i was pretty good at that. >> pretty good, he now admits at not telling the complete truth. what is surprising is he went on to win six medals in london, four gold, two silver. it turns out behind all of the glory, the amazing accomplishments, was a person

who didn't like himself. >> 100% i was lost. pushing a lot of people out of my life. people that i wanted and needed in my life. and was kind of running and running and escaping from whatever it was i was running from. >> reporter: everything seemed to come to a head on september 29th of 2014. phelps had been gambling and drinking that day at a casino in his hometown of baltimore. driving home in a white land rover, he illegally changed lands inside the fort mchenry tunnel. police also clocked him going 84 in a 45 mile per hour zone. >> i sent myself down on a downward spiral. i think it was more of a sign than anything else that i had to get something under control, whatever it was. i look back at that night and everything happened for a reason. i drove that way and if i ever go home from that, i would never go that route. >> so it was a cry for help? >> i believe so, yeah.

i really do. >> phelps was arrested for dui. it was his second time for the same offense. soon after he was released from jail, phelps retreated to his bedroom for four days. >> i was lowest place i have ever been. honestly, at one point i just felt like i didn't want to see another day. i felt it should be over. >> reporter: after some tough love from friends and family, phelps snapped out of those dark thoughts and checked himself into the meadows, a rehab clinic in arizona. >> first couple of nights were just brutal. i probably cried myself to sleep for four or five days. >> in listening to and reading some of the things people closest to you have said about that incident, nobody uses the words alcoholic or drinking problem. so are you an alcoholic? >> i don't know. i would say binge more than anything else. >> so a drinking problem. >> no. i mean, you can put a beer in

front of me or an alcoholic drink in front of me and i won't feel the urge to drink it. >> you checked yourself into the meadows for 45 days. you said you don't know if you are an alcoholic, maybe have a binge problem. did you check yourself into treatment because you had a drinking problem or because you had a public relations problem? >> i checked myself in because i thought something in my life needed to change and i needed to figure things out. >> reporter: in rehab therapy he dealt with a major issue in his life, his dad. his parents divorced when he was 9. he was raised by his mom debbie, a familiar face poolside. as for his dad, fred, a retired maryland state trooper, phelps said he didn't see much of him over the last 20 years. >> one of the biggest things i was able to really overcome was the feeling of being avoided by my father, being abandoned by my father. i was a kid that always wanted a family. whether our parents are together or not, i still wanted a mom and

dad. i never had that for so long. >> reporter: phelps said there was a breakthrough in the relationship when his dad accepted an invitation to visit him in rehab. >> to show that he wanted to still be in my life, so that feeling i had of feeling avoided and abandoned was maybe a misunderstanding. i think we learned more about each other in that visit than the past 20 years. >> what is extraordinary about you, michael, i have known you a long time. i have asked you about your dad in four or five interviews. >> i dodged it every time. >> every time you dodged it artfully. usually with a partial answer. i've never, ever heard you say the things you're saying now. >> i'm comfortable about it. i'm more laid back, relaxed and open. >> reporter: after rehab, phelps received a suspended one year jail sentence. he says he hasn't had a drink since october 2014. phelps is now turning his life

around and surprised many by coming out of retirement for one more olympics, his fifth. >> what was the phone call like when you called your mom and said i think i'm going to go to rio? tears? >> instant. instant tears. she was so happy. >> and there's been a recent major change in his personal life. just ten days ago he and his fiance had a baby boy, nicole johnson, a former miss california, gave birth to 6 pound, 12 ounce boomer robert phelps. the middle name is in honor of michael's coach, bob. phelps told me before the birth he was nervous about being a new father. >> i was like, i don't know how to act. i'm excited, but i don't know what to do. and i've had a couple of friends who have had kids over the last couple of years. i think the one thing that every single one says is that it is the best thing that will ever happen in your life. >> reporter: now preparing for that other major thing in his life, the rio olympic games,

phelps is currently training a arizona state. he says he's in the best shape in nearly a decade and this time around he says he wants to be in the pool. and who's by his side? >> let's go! >> reporter: his long-time coach. >> we all go back a long way. i'm shocked. >> yeah. >> he's like a completely different person. >> absolutely. physically, mentally, emotionally, in all of the areas. >> how does that impact your relationship? >> makes my life awesome because he comes to practice every day. it's all about the swimming now. >> reporter: phelps says he's now having fun both in and out of the pool. he even participated in arizona's state curtain of distraction, stripping down to distract an opposing players free throw. phelps will be 31 in rio and he says no matter what, this is definitely, absolutely, his last olympics.

>> you have goals. you always do. you are famous for those and famous for never sharing -- >> don't waste a question. >> i'm not going to waste it. would it be nice for you to become the oldest swimmer to win a gold medal? >> obviously it would be nice. >> would it be nice to be the first swimmer to win a gold medal 12 years apart? >> pretty cool. >> out of rio, what's realistic? >> there's a number in my head. i've got a number. >> if you don't hit the number, will you be able to look at me and say i went out the way i wanted to go out? >> yeah, because i'm giving an honest effort. i'm having fun again. and this is something that i haven't had in a really long time. it is just like, i'm going out and enjoying myself every day i get back out in the water. i feel like a high school kid again. >> coming up -- >> i would buy a airplane. >> a big stuffed animal. >> what would you do with this past week's eye-popping powerball jackpot? >> buy a big screen tv. >> big dreams from the little

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whether you have been listening to the presidential candidates new tax plans or just like a lot. like a thousand dollars.

>> 187. >> 200. and that's how much i have. >> $10. >> 100 zillion. >> the $429 million powerball, the winner is in new jersey. >> if i had $430 million, i would buy a big screen tv. >> a speedboat. >> a cuddly bear. >> i'd like macaroni and cheese. >> i thought you would like it in your sandwich too. >> a gold mansion. >> 1,000 dolphins. >> those are my favorite animals. >> i would buy an airplane. >> a big stuffed animal. >> a giant bear. >> no. i'm not going to buy that. >> to make the tax system fair. >> taxes. >> taxes. >> taxes. >> not like taxis. taxis are a kind of car. taxes. [ screaming ]

>> really have no idea. >> taxes is what you pay to live in that house forever. >> pay to the government. so that the government can do stuff for you like run the schools and stuff, yeah. >> it's okay if i'm poor. it's okay if i'm rich and i'm okay with everything because all i want to do is just be happy with what i have. >> any way you add it up, that was priceless. that's "on assignment" for tonight. we'll see you here next sunday at 7:00, 6:00 central. here's what we are working on for next week. we're in south korea but we didn't come to seoul to look at the latest electronic gadgetry. no, we are here to see puppies. if you have a dog in your home you love more than some family members, you can get it cloned here. six of them all together? >> yes. >> all clones. >> yes, they're all clones. >> looks like a happy dog. a happy clone. >> that's next week "on

assignment." i'll see you weeknights for "nbc nightly news". i'm lester holt. thanks for joining us. the nextn of superstar. oh! how did you get here? did you fly? no, i fly in an airplane. yeah, i didn't mean did you flap, i... you won't believe what these kids can do, and you probably won't believe what they gonna say. have you played any clubs? our first show as at a bar. [ laughter ] harvey: you are in for a mind-blowing ride tonight. [ giggles ]