Episode 706: All or Nothing

All or Nothing
Season 7, Episode 6
Air date	July 18, 2013
Written by	Matt Nix, Rashad Raisani
Directed by	Jonathan Frakes
Episode Guide
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All or Nothing is the sixth episode of the seventh season and the one hundred and fourth episode of Burn Notice.

Notes

Clients: Barry

Bad Guys: Cody, Frakes

Synopsis

Michael and Fiona pose as hackers to steal information for Sonya; Sam and Jesse help Barry find a former girlfriend.

Spy Facts

For a spy, running is more than just a way to stay in shape. It keeps your mind focused, and reduces stress, which are essential when you're working deep cover. It also gives you a good excuse to be in secluded areas, which makes arranging covert meetings a lot easier, if you don't mind being a little sweaty.

Faking a computer hack isn't that complicated. All you need to do is create a dummy website, and run some high-end network scanning software. Of course, the hard part is making it look like your hacking is getting results. To do that, you need a team.

Probing for a weakness in your enemy's security is all about vanity. The less impressed you are, the more they tend to tell you. Of course, just because you're looking for a weakness, doesn't mean there is one.

When you need access to a restricted area and you know you're being watched closely, a direct approach is best. Sneaking around when you're under surveillance just arouses suspicion. The key is to act like you're doing nothing wrong.

As a rule, the faster a drill turns, the louder it is. That's why drills used in covert ops have special gear boxes that move at low speeds. With the right drill bit, they can still get through most walls, though it may take a minute or two to do it.

For spies, flirting is a powerful tool to manipulate your target. Of course, just because it's effective doesn't mean it's pleasant.

The risk of using a cover with a skill set you don't have is that at some point, someone may demand results. When failure is inevitable, you lie, deny, and put the blame on others.

For spies, there's no separating your work life from your personal one. Sometimes it's hard to understand even your own true motives. If you're doing things for yourself, or for the good of the operation. It's a cold reality that most of the people you love will never understand. But the truth is, at a certain point, it doesn't really matter what your real motives are, because once you've made a choice in the field, you can never take it back.

Full Recap

Michael meets up with Agent Strong, who is excited about Michael's progress, and tells him about the hacker network Sonya wants destroyed. Strong then tells Michael he made arrangements for Fiona to help out. Michael resist adamantly but Strong doesn't budge. Michael is not pleased. Michael mets up with Sonya for lunch and they exchange a moderately romantic greeting. She tells him she wants to steal a virus that a hacker has developed for the Department of Defense. She says she doesn't know who the target is just yet, but that "someone" has arranged for the target to have a medical emergency of some kind. Michael is intended to play a doctor and stick the guy with a syringe. Sonya refuses to reveal who the "someone" is who is setting up the emergency and says Michael will "never" meet this person. She wants Michael to "act on faith."

A guy suddenly has a seizure and Michael heads over to play the hero. He turns the man on his side to give him an injection in the neck while asking everyone to give him some room to work. He asks Sonya to help and she does -- by stealing a thumb drive from the guy's jacket pocket. Michael gets a hero's salutation as he sends the man and his friends off to the hospital for additional observation. He and Sonya leave.

Fi shows up in the driveway at Michael's place where he's packing up what remains and says he found some new snow globes. Sonya walks out and Fi is taken aback. Sonya tells Fi that Michael speaks so highly of her "I thought he was trying to make me jealous." Fi says her help doesn't come cheap.

Up in the loft, they start going over plans to get into the hackers' mainframe. Michael wants to try to get in as a hacker. It doesn't seem like the best plan, so they go to Barry, who isn't thrilled with them and he isn't happy about trying to infiltrate "The Collective" -- the hacker group in question. Sam suggests Michaek could find out where some of Barry's clients' money went after these hackers got into his files. He also wants them to find the girlfriend who left him and he's on board. He warns them, though, that "people who tangle with The Collective tend to find themselves face down in The Everglades."

At a club where Fi is set to meet with the guy who brings new hackers on board for the The Collective, Michael tries to tell Fi he can get her out of this. She refuses, saying she has to do this because she can't owe her freedom to him. They meet with the hacker hirer who isn't interested until they blown his socks off by "hacking" into the power grid and shutting down all the power at the club -- with some covert assistance from Sonya, Sam and Jesse. The guy hires them both.

Michael and Fi go to the hackers' office to meet the real guy who does the hiring, and he says he's never heard of them. They give a story about a hacking job that went bad and getting in trouble with the mob with fatal consequences, so they have taken great steps to make themselves "hard to find." The guy buys it and gives them a tour of their security operation. They don't find a weakness the security system, but Michael suddenly asks about his chair and demands yogurt in the fridge.

He reports this back to Sonya, who says "failure's not an option." Michael and Fi then suggest hijacking the security camera feed, which comes in from an outside wall. Michael thinks they can access it from the roof, but they need Sonya to make arrangements for a high-bandwidth video transmitter to override the system. She says they'll have it the next day.

Jesse, meanwhile, shows Barry is old girlfriend's car. They tell him the car is connected to some sleazy guys who fence cars. They go talk to the stereotypical slimy used-car lot owner and, despite first pulling a gun on them and having Jesse grab it and pry it from his hands, he tells them the guy who brought the Lamborghini is a guy named Pike who brings in cars and takes cash. This comes only after they've made some serious body damage to at least two cars on the lot.

Back at the hacker office, Michael and Fi are headed to the roof, which they're told is off limits. Michael then acts out a massive nicotine-induced need for a smoke break. Their boss reluctantly gives them permission. Once on the roof, they rappel down the side of the building with Sonya watching and guiding them along the way. They drill through the wall, hook a cable through and attach a device to some exposed wires to hijack the security camera system. Once they're done, the pipe that Fi's rope is tied to on the roof breaks loose and she nearly falls the eight floors to the ground but Michael catches her. For a few moments, which seem like eternity as Michael flashes back to their many close calls over the years, Fi struggles to climb onto Michael's back. Once she does, he slowly and exhaustingly pulls them both up one rope to the roof. She hugs him close and their cheeks touch before she says, "Thanks."

"Don't mention it," he says. She says they should go back inside. Sonya hears all this through their open cell phone lines.

Sonya tells Michael that all the technical obstacles are out of their way, but Cody, the boss, never leaves anyone alone. Michael says Fi could probably entice Cody out of the office for the 20 minutes Michael would need to get into the mainframe. Sonya asks him if he'd be comfortable with that and he asks why he wouldn't' be. She says it wasn't hard to figure out that Fi was his girlfriend, then she asks him if it was worth having a personal life outside of being a spy. She says he isn't sure he did and that trying to has caused a lot of pain. When she asks if the pain was worth it, he says, "Honestly, I don't know."

Barry, Jesse and Sam are staking out Pike's house and he's getting impatient. They get a look at Pike packing up a black SUV with bags and guns. Jesse and Sam confront Pike with guns in hand and it turns out that Pike is Tricia's new boyfriend. He says he dumped Tricia's car for cash because she never wanted it. That was how they met. Also, they're going away for the weekend and there aren't guns in the bags -- just fishing poles. Jesse, Sam and Barry leave and apologize for the whole gun thing.

Fi flirts with Cody and he takes her out of the office. Sonya reports to Michael on their progress. She then taps into the security camera, which flash for a moment but the camera monitors don't pay much attention. Michael gets into the room and does some fancy computer stuff, but Sonya sees that the big boss has gone to the security room and asked about where Cody is. THey say he left with the new girl. The big boss wonders why the cameras look fuzzy and doesn't believe it's just a loose connection. Sonya warns Michael to get out of there and the big boss fixes the cameras and sees Michael in the server area where he shouldn't be. The big boss goes to confront Michael, who says he was using the restroom. The big boss wants to see the work Michael is doing and says that if it isn't as good as Michael claims it is, they're "going to have a very big problem."

Sam and Jesse show up outside the hackers' building, where Sonya tells them about Michael's predicament. She gives them semi-automatic rifles and says they need to bust in and get him, saying this can't fail and she can't leave Michael behind. Jesse doesn't think a suicide mission is the way to go, but Sam agrees he's not going to sit back and watch Michael die. Jesse comes up with a different plan after hearing that Cody isn't in the building. He tells Sam they're going to need a couple of police badges and tells Sonya to give them all the security camera footage she has of Cody for a "big-ass Hail Mary."

Sam and Jesse find Cody and Fi sitting outside at a bar and, posing as cops, tell Cody that they've had a warrant to tap into the security cameras and Sam starts listing all the charges he could face. Cody asks to talk privately, then can't believe when they ask him to go undercover. Sam says they're going to raid the office in the afternoon, but he could help by putting the thumb drive Sonya stole into the mainframe in the server room. Cody says he'd be killed if he was caught, but Jesse says the SWAT team will be outside and will pull him out if anything goes wrong. Cody wants to talk to his lawyer, but they tell him there will be no deal if they have to "arrest" him.

Back in the office, Michael is struggling to show that he can hack computers. The big boss decides to give him five minutes, and after that he's going to shoot him. Fi shows up and takes the focus off Michael by telling the big boss that Cody was meeting with the cops. The boss doesn't believe her, but she asks him where Cody is and the security team says Cody's been in the server room for 30 minutes. The boss confronts Cody, who first denies he's working for the cops, then admits it and says he "had no choice" and that the cops are watching them right outside. Michael and Fi say they're going to leave, and the big boss lets them.

Michael and Fi give Barry all the accounts the hackers stole, but Barry is a little heartbroken about his ex. He says he was going to get Tricia a ring and he never got around to it. He says, "You miss your moment and now it's gone."

After Barry leaves, Michael tells Fi he's sorry she had to get involved, but she says "working together was never our problem." He says it will soon "all be over," but she says, "Michael, it's already over" before leaving.

Michael comes back to his loft with a storm raging outside. He's drenched and Sonya is inside working on a laptop in short shorts and and off-the-shoulder blouse. He tells her he wants to know who she's working with and says he's earned it. She tells him the organization isn't just a job and that he has to be willing to give up everything and make "extreme sacrifices." He gets enraged, standing in the middle of his charred loft and throws one of Fi's snow globes against a wall and shouts about how he doesn't have anything left. He tells her his brother is dead and his mother will never forgive him for that. He says his friends have nothing but pity in their eyes when he looks at them.

"This thing that you're a part of, you're the only thing that I have left," he says, crying.

"That's one thing we have in common," she says.

Michael leans in and kisses her, and she kisses him back. They sleep together and Voiceover Michael says that spies can have trouble separating their personal lives from their work lives and it and be hard to keep track of what their real motivations are, but "once you've made a choice in the field you can never take it back. Meanwhile, Fi is laying on her own side of the bed she's sharing with Carlos, texting Michael, "We should talk." But instead of sending the message she deletes it and puts her phone aside.

The next morning, Sonya is leaving and Michael asks, "So?"

"I'll make the call," she says.