Bob Lindsay stared out an open window on the second floor of his spacious four bedroom house in Malibu. It was shaping up to be a hot day in Southern California, but a cool breeze kept his house at balmy temperatures. It paid to be blocks from the beach, although he never really went swimming. He never had time to. These days, all he had time for was work and then what he liked to call "work II", which involved networking with various politicians and other powerful men to maintain his influence in the intelligence community. Ever since his promotion to NSC director, his personal life had slowly crumbled around his ears. Angry with the hours he spent away, his wife had left him, and his children, already grown, had no interest in a man who had no time for them. And really, why should they? He didn't blame them. It was all right, really. He had his work, after all, and national security was important, life saving, heroic work. Terrorists don't get holidays, so why should he?
He sighed and turned away from the window. On his desk sat the stack of documents that would finalize Jack Bristow's unconditional release and reinstatement into the CIA. All they needed was his signature. Bob remembered the day Bristow's file first crossed his desk. Some days, it just didn't pay to get out of bed. He was having his counterintelligence department run routine checks on all personnel with level 9 clearance and above. One of the analysts had flagged Bristow for investigation, and passed the file along to him. Reading that file had set what was left of Bob's hair on end. Bristow ticked practically every box on the espionage checklist. He was a loner, with antisocial tendencies and few attachments, which made one wonder where his loyalties really lay. He was manipulative, self-serving, and possessed a cavalier attitude towards the law which reflects a lack of respect for authority. It wasn't these qualities that really disturbed him, though. Many agents, especially ones who had been in the field as long as Bristow had, tended to demonstrate these sorts of qualities. After a lifetime working in counterintelligence, Bob Lindsay understood that better than most. But when he factored in the personal stresses in Bristow's life, such as the recent loss of his daugher, the alarm bells started ringing. He had seen it enough times to know that this was an agent on the brink.
He had started investigating Bristow immediately. When they eventually uncovered evidence that he was communicating with Irina Derevko, it was enough to convince Bob that Jack Bristow was no longer on the brink, but had in fact been pushed over the edge by his daughter's death. What to do with him, though? They had spent months investigating Bristow, but the man was just too good at covering his tracks. They had no real evidence against him, but a decision had to be made, and soon. His continued access to CIA resources constituted a huge breach in national security. Eventually, Bob had made the decision to incarcerate him without trial. It had been a difficult decision to make. Bob loved the United States, and the principals on which it was founded, such as a man's right to face his accusers in a fair trial. In the gray area, however, there sometimes wasn't time for due process.
Then he was forced to reevaluate his decision. He hated having to rethink decisions that he'd already made, but Sydney Bristow was a difficult woman to deny. She had been an exemplary agent, and he felt truly sorry for her condition. He knew what it was like to come home one day to find all your loved ones gone. He didn't take kindly to being threatened, but at the end of the day, he understood her motivations, even if he didn't condone her actions. So here he was…making a deal with the devil.
Grimly, he signed the papers. May God forgive him.