Broken Bird

Broken Bird is the fourth episode of the second season of Secret City.

Synopsis
Harriet turns up the heat on Helen. Lockhart entrusts Sullivan with a low-key mission. Karen pushes to be part of an elite committee.

Plot
William Vaughn's (Justin Smith) alarm rings, but he is already awake. There is a silent tension between him and his wife, Maj. Helen Wu (Renee Lim), after the events at the carpark, where the couple ambushed Sami Almasi (Robert Rabiah) and his associate Mustafa (Parham Esmailpour), killing the latter, and stole their weapons. Vaughn's bullets missed Sami's vital organs, and he is currently in post-op. Wu is worried that he will retaliate, but Vaughn thinks Sami would not risk coming after the Director of the ASD. Wu disagrees.

At Capital Hill, Prime Minister Ewan Garrity (Don Hany) is surrounded by journalists asking him about the recent Pale Horse fiasco. He ignores them, instead greeting the American motorcade that has just pulled in. American Ambassador to Australia Kip Buchanan (Christopher Kirby) introduced Garrity to the U.S. Secretary of Defence Richard Gascoigne (Rob MacPherson). In his office, Gascoigne shares an anecdote about how an NBA player made a last ditch attempt in a tied game, but ended up scoring a basket for the opposing team, letting them win. Garrity replies, "I guess it's hard to play for your own team when you don't know what game's being played," implicitly referring to how the U.S. had kept Australia in the dark regarding Pale Horse despite them being allies. Gascoigne apologises, and assures Garrity that the U.S. had made sure that Garrity and key strategic sites were protected, but Garrity points out that he does not need protection; the four murdered Australians did. Gascoigne replies that Trebuchet has been supplying the U.S. with hardware for 20 years and so could be trusted, meaning that the bombing at Davoren Park was the result of enemy hacking. He suggests that Pale Horse continue operation, but Garrity insists that Pale Horse be grounded until every detail of what happened is ascertained. They agree they have to find the wayward drone.

At the Department of Defence, Harriet Dunkley (Anna Torv) meets with Wu to convince her to release information about Pale Horse to the public to quell the worries of MP Karen Koutoufides' (Danielle Cormack) constituents. Wu says the information is classified and that, in any case, Pale Horse has been suspended. Dunkley notices a picture from former Home Affairs Minister Catriona Bailey (Jacki Weaver) in Wu's office. She tells Wu that just after the Davoren Park bombing, Bailey was murdered with a stolen military weapon, and asks her pointedly whether she holds 9mm Berettas (the kind used to kill Bailey) in her cache. She reveals that she knows about Wu's arrangement with the Almasis, and warns that Wu could be linked to Bailey's murder. Wu, however, surmises that Dunkley does not yet have any proof of her transactions, and Dunkley leaves her office. On her way out, she passes a guard (Marina Rowe) escorting Caroline Treloar ("Cal") (Laura Gordon) and eyes the latter suspiciously, recognising her from the photograph in Lt. Joseph Sullivan's apartment.

Sullivan (Rob Collins) arrives at the house of Air Chief Marshall Wes Lockwood (Andrew McFarlane), and asks where Cal is. Lockwood reassures him that she has undergone assessment for her mental health, and is now safe, receiving medication and counselling. Sullivan questions why Lockwood is suddenly so interested in Cal's wellbeing. Lockwood says that Cal's medical history makes her an easy scapegoat for Davoren Park, and that they have to protect her and strengthen her until she is strong enough to cope on her own. Before Lockwood leaves, Sullivan asks him again where Cal is, but Lockwood reminds Sullivan again and goes for his meeting in Russell. As Sullivan is driving away, Dunkley calls him to tell him she knows where Cal is. She first wants to know who Cal is (she guesses correctly she was the drone pilot), and why Sullivan has been looking for her. She ends up telling him that Cal was at the Department of Defence.

Cal is meeting with Garrity, who tells her he is just there to chat informally about what happened ("from the Pale Horse's mouth"). He says he knows she ran kill missions in Pakistan, but would be selective in what will tell the public. Given that drones are "essentially flying computers", he asks her whether they could be hacked, but Cal says the drone was not hacked. Garrity tries to emotionally manipulate her by asking how many innocent civilians she thinks she has killed, but she says that as Prime Minister, she was acting under his orders. He insinuates that their jobs are very similar, sitting in rooms away from the action, dealing with the consequences of other people's actions, but Cal reiterates that she has already said everything she knows in her statement.

Two men are in a hilly area and call Trebuchet CEO Michael Lavelle (Michael Denkha) to tell him they have located the drone, but that the data brick is gone. Lavelle is not happy.

Dunkley watches media coverage of Gascoigne's visit with Garrity. Koutoufides arrives at work, and the two discuss how Gascoigne's unplanned visit right after Pale Horse became public knowledge – especially since the official story is that the project is a completely Australian undertaking – points to something suspicious. Dunkley begins to research Wu's relationship with Bailey. Koutoufides' assistant Declan Boyd (Benedict Hardie) has been seeing someone who works in the Home Affairs Ministry, but he refuses to ask her to access Bailey's social media account for Dunkley. Instead, Boyd himself gives Dunkley access. They notice a lot of advertisements for Oliver Choi, which Dunkley assumes is spam. However, when she tries to click one, she realises they are password protected. As she scrolls down Bailey's Chatterbox feed, she comes across a post about Cpl. Gavin Markson (Graeme McRae), an Australian soldier taken hostage in Pakistan.

Pakistani Ambassador Yasir Younis (Dalip Sondhi) is meeting with Garrity, Lockwood and Defence Minister and interim Home Affairs Minister Jim Hellier (Joel Tobeck) to discuss this case. He seeks their patience, telling them the Pakistani government is negotiating with the Haqqani network but they have yet to state their demands. Hellier lets slip that a drone in the Pale Horse programme could have been hacked, but Garrity quickly interjects that it is still under investigation. Younis asks what would have been the point of hacking a drone only used in military exercises (i.e. not in active combat in places like Pakistan). He says that Pakistan has put up with Western military presence for a long time, but if Australia sends combat troops to get Markson out, Pakistan will treat it as an act of invasion. Hellier interrupts to tell Garrity that Trebuchet has found the drone.

Lockwood brings Cal to Sullivan's hotel room, leaving her in his care. Before he leaves, he whispers something to Sullivan, out of Cal's earshot. Sullivan assures Cal he is not one of "them", and tries to hug her, but she rejects him. She franticly searches for a computer, saying "everyone's lying about everything". She starts to cry and Sullivan comforts her.

Dunkley arrives at Maconochie Prison to meet Mina Almasi (Louisa Mignone), but hesitates before entering, recalling her own experience there. They sit in silence for a few moments, before Dunkley asks her why she decided to run a stolen weapons business despite being a fugitive. When Mina is shocked that she knows, Dunkley reminds her that she was her "courier", having gone to and witnessed the handover between Wu and Sami. After assuring Mina that Sami will survive, Dunkley asks her about Wu. Mina says that if she reveals anything to the authorities, she will be locked away and her daughter Aliah (Jayanna Assaf) will be left parentless, but Dunkley disagrees, saying that sharing information about Sami's business will help find Bailey's murderer and set Mina free. Dunkley runs the idea by Mina that Bailey could have been trading military secrets in response to which Wu arranged for her murder using one of her stolen 9mm guns, but Mina refuses to answer. Instead, Mina tells Dunkley that the way to get to Wu is through her husband, Vaughn.

Dunkley goes to pay Wu a visit at her house in Yarralumla, and asks her point blank whether it was Vaughn who had shot at Mustafa and Sami (it was). Vaughn comes to the door, and Wu updates him that Dunkley "knows about the carpark". Dunkley confirms that she saw both the weapons exchange with Sami and the death of Mustafa. Dunkley absconds Vaughn for putting his wife's life in danger, since he does not have field training. She also does not understand why Wu would be doing it, to which Vaughn explains that Wu is a gambler, despite people only ever losing in gambling. Vaughn assures Dunkley that the weapons deal is over, and asks for her silence. Dunkley says she has to find Bailey's killer; if Vaughn helps her decrypt a file that would let her find them, she will not expose Wu for selling the killer their weapon. She shows him the Oliver Choi advertisement on Bailey's Chatterbox page, and Vaughn says he will brute-force it. After a while, he is able to decrypt the file embedded in the advertisement. It is a map of Pakistan tracking coalition ground assets, specifically bases and safe houses. One of these is Miramshah, North Waziristan, the safe house that was ambushed and from where Markson was captured. They realise that Bailey sent this file to the Chinese Ministry of State Security (MSS) in Beijing. Dunkley says she already knew Bailey was a spy, but wonders why no one else in the bureaucracy did. Vaughn asks her not to mention this to anyone, sincere leaking classified information comes with a 20-year prison sentence, but Dunkley says that Vaughn has the power to bring this to light. With that, she leaves his house.

Meanwhile, Cal and Sullivan just finished dinner in his hotel room. Cal confirms that she had gone to Davoren Park the night after the bombing – she had to see it for herself – and it was her that he saw from across the road. He says he does not think it was her fault. He asks her what happened, but she does not answer. She asks him again for a computer. He says she needs to rest, but goes to get the computer anyway. While he is in the other room, Cal eyes her glass of milk suspiciously and pours it down the sink. She goes through Sullivan's trash and finds medication that she concludes he put in her drink, prompting her to tell him through the door she is not sick. He waits in the next room as she passes out. Some time later, Sullivan has put Cal to bed. He receives a text from Dunkley ("Harri" on his phone) saying she is at his hotel and asking if he wants to get a drink. He leaves Cal in his suite to meet Dunkley, shortly after which Cal wakes up. She empties her bags and takes a large quantity of pills. She finally finds a laptop and logs onto an encrypted chat platform, through which she messages a man with the initials "J.S." (Christopher Sommers). He asks if she is safe, and tells her to log off immediately. She asks for his help, but he says he has "it" and tells her again to "get off", before terminating the conversation. (It is seen that someone is monitoring this conversation and trying to trace the messages.) Cal breaks into the suite's safe, where she finds a gun. She takes the gun and laptop, and leaves.

Dunkley and Sullivan are having drinks at the bar. She asks him if he has found the pilot yet, but he does not appreciate being questions. Dunkley says she (Cal) is the only one who knows what happened at Davoren Park, and that the Department of Defence is clearly trying to keep her quiet. Sullivan discredits this as a conspiracy theory, to which Dunkley throws what she knows about Marimshah at him. Sullivan thinks someone bribed the tribal residents of the area to leak information that led to his unit (which included Markson) being ambushed. He thinks she has concocted these conspiracy theories to flirt with him, by putting them both on the same team to "conquer the bad guys together". Dunkley ignores this, and asks him what he really feels about Marimshah. Sullivan again thinks that Dunkley just wants to know his secrets so she will be able to trust him, having been hurt by another man in the past. He then admits that if he knew who was responsible for the death and capture of his men, he would execute them "at night, from behind, so they didn't see it coming". He leaves her at the bar.

Cal has been watching their conversation, and when Dunkley leaves, she follows her. Sullivan goes back to his room to find the safe empty and Cal missing. Cal turns up at Dunkley's apartment and asks whether she and Sullivan are hooking up, before coming in. She confirms that Dunkley is (or was) a journalist, and says that she did not run after the bomb went off. Instead, the military was trying to chase her to prevent her from leaking that the Australian Air Force is running kill missions in Pakistan. She reveals, though, that she is not hired by the Air Force, since Sullivan had shut that door by telling them that Cal is "too sick for service". He did this because they are married; Sullivan is Cal's husband. However, Cal does not reveal who she actually works for. She says she will get proof of the kill missions. Before she leaves, she says she does not mind if Dunkley sleeps with Sullivan, but warns her not to trust him. She asks to use the bathroom. Unknown to Dunkley, Cal has taken her wallet and takes out her credit cards and cash. She climbs out the window and escapes, leaving Dunkley to find Cal gone and her wallet empty.

Elsewhere, Alex Berezin turns up at Koutoufides' house for a booty call.

The following day, at Parliament House, Dunkley asks Koutoufides if she can get on the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, which Koutoufides finds laughable. Dunkley tells Koutoufides about the kill missions in Pakistan, which explains Gascoigne's visit. She says she does not have proof, but Koutoufides getting on the Committee could be the way to get some. Koutoufides goes to speak to Garrity. He says he cannot give her Intelligence and Security as there has never been an Independent on that Committee, offering her Energy and Environment instead. She insists on Intelligence and Security, despite Garrity's argument that she could achieve more in the latter, arguing that she was obliged to explain to her constituents why drones were bombing their neighbourhoods. She pushes Garrity for the truth on Pale Horse, but he says he will not be threatened. She says he needs her support in the face of a minority government, but he says that Derek Conway (William Wallace) is providing the confidence and supply he needs, leaving her speechless.

While Vaughn is at work, comes home from running errands. She does not realise when Sami enters the house just moments after her. He confronts her in the kitchen, and asks her for his money and weapons, telling her to return one. Vaughn's home surveillance system is linked to his office computers, so he sees Sami cornering Wu. He calls Wu, in response to which Sami turns to the camera in the kitchen and indicate that Vaughn should keep his lips sealed. Sami makes his threat clear, then leaves. Vaughn drives out to meet Sami, warning him not to come for him and his wife or else he will use all the tools at his disposal as ASD Director to retaliate against Sami. He then offers Sami his guns, but Sami makes him carry them for him, sarcastically explaining that he was still recovering from his gunshot wounds (inflicted by Sami).

Lavelle is presenting Trebuchet's findings to a panel comprised of Garrity, Lockwood, Gascoigne, Buchanan and Hellier. He claims that Trebuchet has analysed the log records from the data brick (despite them never having recovered it) and 'confirms' that GPS spoofing techniques were used to control the unmanned aerial vehicle. Gascoigne says that Iran had done this to an American drone a few years ago, but that drone did not drop a bomb, to which Lavelle clarifies that one the drone is hacked, it can be commanded any way. When Garrity asks him where the hacker is located, Lavelle lies and says the ISP address is in Islamabad, Pakistan, specifically Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), the Pakistani secret service. Gascoigne cannot believe that Pakistan would do such a thing, given that they receive large amounts of aid from the U.S. Garrity says he will not act on this without indisputable proof, which Lavelle claims he has. Garrity asks to speak to Cal, which is when Lockwood tells him that she is missing. Later on, wiith Garrity insistent on letting the ongoing negotiations play out, Lockwood tries to get him to retaliate against Pakistan to get Markson back. Gascoigne supports Lockwood by suggesting that Pakistan can no longer be trusted, including in negotiations. Hellier proposes reinstating Pale Horse to monitor Haqqani activity, which will lead them to Markson. Even Buchanan agrees that diplomatic options are a "waste of time", with Gascoigne offering American troops. Garrity reminds his advisors of Younis' warning that this would be seen as an act of war, but this is a risk all the other men in the room seem willing to take, to which Hellier adds that Garrity's government cannot survive the loss of another Australian soldier.

Lockwood and Hellier see the American delegation off after their meeting. Garrity goes to see Koutoufides and offers her a position on the Intelligence and Security Committee, asking her to review the evidence of the drone hack "as a matter of priority". It is clear he does not trust the enthusiasm of his advisors to go to war with Pakistan. Koutoufides is wary of Garrity and makes it clear that she is not his puppet, but he tells her to do what she always does and "ask the hard questions" and to not "accept any bullshit".

At the same time, Cal arrives in a taxi at Captains Flat. She walks up to a house and bangs on the door of the man she was chatting with earlier ("J.S."). He scolds her for being so rash, as the military probably followed her to his house. When he does not let her in, she shoots the door open and barges in. A while later, Cal storms out of J.S.'s house, gets in a minivan and drives away.

Cal stops in the middle of a field. She takes out a pickaxe from the minivan, and starts to dig near a tree. She unearths a silver box and opens it to reveal a black box resembling a hard drive. She connects it to the laptop she stole from Sullivan. She launches the drone data recovery utility, implying that she has the missing data brick from the UAV. She begins downloading its data onto a USB drive.

Meanwhile, Dunkley calls her bank to report Cal's fraudulent use of her credit card to book her taxi. She tries to get the address that Cal was dropped off at, but is refused on the grounds of privacy laws. She threatens to use her position as Koutoufides' media advisor to spread the word that the operator was "aiding and abetting criminal activity" prompting the operator to give her the address. She drives to J,S,'s house and knocks on the door. When nobody answers, she lets herself in, only to find J.S. dead at his desk, murdered with his eyes gauged out. It can be assumed that Cal is responsible.

Cast

 * Anna Torv as Harriet Dunkley, Senior Media Advisor to MP Karen Koutoufides, formerly Political Analyst at The Daily Nation.
 * Danielle Cormack as Karen Koutoufides, Independent MP for Wakefield, SA, and Alex Berezin's love interest.
 * Laura Gordon as Caroline "Cal" Treloar, former drone pilot in the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF).
 * Rob Collins as Lt. Joseph Sullivan.
 * Justin Smith as William Vaughn, Australia Signals Directorate (ASD) Director and husband of Maj. Helen Wu.
 * Don Hany as Ewan Garrity, Prime Minister (PM).
 * Andrew McFarlane as ACM Wes Lockwood, Chief of Defence.
 * Joel Tobeck as Jim Hellier, Defence Minister and interim Home Affairs Minister.
 * Marcus Graham as Andrew "Griff" Griffiths, Chief of Staff (COS) to the Home Affairs Minister, formerly Senior Political Analyst at The Daily Nation.
 * Robert Rabiah as Sami Almasi, husband of Mina Almasi.
 * Louisa Mignone as Mina Almasi, Iraqi refugee and former prison mate of Harriet Dunkley, wife of Sami Almasi.
 * Benedict Hardie as Declan Boyd, Assistant to MP Karen Koutoufides.
 * Aleks Mikic as Thomas Maher, Junior Analyst in ASD.
 * Tom Wren as Alex Berezin, lobbyist for Vanguard Energy and MP Karen Koutoufides' love interest.
 * Christopher Kirby as Kip Buchanan, American Ambassador to Australia.
 * Michael Denkha as Michael Lavelle, Trebuchet CEO of Southeast Asia Operations.
 * Renee Lim as Maj. Helen Wu, officer in Australian Army and wife of William Vaughn.
 * Rob MacPherson as Richard Gascoigne, U.S. Secretary of Defence.
 * Dalip Sondhi as Yasir Younis, Pakistani Ambassador to Australia.
 * Christopher Sommers as John Smith.
 * Leah Baulch as female prison guard.
 * Caria Watt as Defence Department receptionist.
 * Michael Handley and Marina Rowe as Defence Department security guards.