Jack Bauer was always out of time.
It spun by faster than he, the clock's staccato tick-tick-tick drove him forward, demanding, unceasing, uncaring in what it pushed him into doing, what it pressured him into becoming. There was no looking back, no second-guessing. There was no time for any of that because he was going too slowly – or the world was going too fast.
Until it wasn't. Until the unending tick-tick-tick stalled, when the beating of his heart doubled, trebled, every sluggish second the rest of the world lived by. Then he knew everything that was going to happen, remember every dreadful thing he'd ever done. When he'd be able to do anything, but could do none of it because he was going too fast – or the world was going too slow.
He lived his life out of time.