Alfred Bester SPECIES: Human
HOMEWORLD: Earth
DATE OF BIRTH: Unknown
ORGANISATION: Psi Corp, Earth Alliance
STATUS: Psi Cop
ALLEGIANCE: Unknown
ACTOR: Walter Koenig
Alfred Bester
SPECIES: Human
HOMEWORLD: Earth
DATE OF BIRTH: Unknown
ORGANISATION: Psi Corp, Earth Alliance
STATUS: Psi Cop
ALLEGIANCE: Unknown
ACTOR: Walter Koenig
An Earth-born member of Psi Corps from the age of ten, who describe him as a "most valued member" in their propaganda brochure "The Psi Corps and You", although not valued enough to be able to have his pregnant lover, Carolyn Sanderson, removed from the Psi Corps' reeducation facility on Mars Colony where he has a wife and daughter in a loveless marriage arranged by Psi Corps. Psi Cop Bester's first of several visits to Babylon 5 was when he was assigned with another Psi Cop, Kelsey, to capture Jason Ironheart but was thwarted when Ironheart evolved into a higher level of being as a result of delays caused by Commander Sinclair's lack of co-operation. Partly out of revenge for this he later sent his friend Ari Ben Zayn to investigate the command staff of Babylon 5 along with a Psi Corps aide Harriman Gray.
Bester himself returned to Babylon 5 twice the following year, firstly for a Psi Corps conference held there after its initially proposed location, the Royal Tharsis Lodge, was hit by a terrorist attack moments before he would have arrived with his new assistant, Harriman Gray, declaring Talia Winters to be a rogue telepath after she fled following a bomb blast that left him injured and many members of a high-level Psi Corps meeting dead. He personally took charge of the operation to eliminate the members of Free Phobos, the terrorist group who were responsible, and only pardoned Talia Winters when he was blackmailed into doing so by Michael Garibaldi using evidence of Psi Corps' members gambling in Babylon 5's casino. His next visit came while hunting for the underground railroad of rogue telepaths passing through the station organized by Dr. Stephen Franklin, only to be apparently tricked by Talia Winters and Rick into believing he had killed the rogues.
Bester returned on another clean-up operation in 2260, passing through the gun sight of Susan Ivanova as she targeted his approaching transport with Babylon 5's defense grid rather than let him dock, but arrived with only a vague feeling that he had been in grave danger when John Sheridan prevented her from firing at his ship. Once aboard, and prevented from scanning any of the command staff first by a shield of Minbari telepaths and then by an injection of sleepers he enlisted Michael Garibaldi into helping him in the pursuit of dust smugglers during which they managed to establish a good professional relationship, if not a friendly one.
Later that year he returned alone in a Black Omega Starfury to Babylon 5 with the news that a transport containing "weapons components" was bound for the rim where they were to be used by the allies of President Clark, the Shadows, and seeking John Sheridan's help in stopping this delivery taking place. In reality, as Bester well knew, these components were telepaths a fact that he neglected to mention lest it effect Sheridan's willingness to help him rescue them for his grandiose plans of telepaths being the future with himself as a leader. Upon the discovery of Carolyn on the transport, programmed by allies of the Shadows to attack Psi Corps out of a desire for self preservation and with a cybernetic implant on her forehead, Bester declared that "my enemy's enemy is my friend" and offered to form an alliance with Sheridan, stating that he would do anything if they would help Carolyn recover.
