"Worse, from a defense viewpoint, there are times when they must have information fast and when the nature of the news means that no ship will be either available or allowed to become available to carry the news. Suppose you are an intelligent life-form off Canopus and you think up a magnificent way of taking over the Solar System. You're six hundred and fifty light-years away, but time is no problem because either you live longer than that or you have a tribe-culture. Even if the system had a billion police ships, which it hasn't, it could never be sure of catching Canopus preparing, or intercepting whatever horror they sent off. And even if it were lucky, the ship would have to come back itself to get the news to the Solar Government. "A Diver can send his mind instantaneously from one end of the universe to the other, he can examine atomic particles or survey galaxies, he can see through matter as if it were full of holes--which it is--he can patrol sectors and report exactly what he found there. He can dive into deep space and be free." "Yes," Fred Williams said. "That's it. Free. That's exactly how we feel, isn't it?" "Never mind. You'll be going out again. Regularly. With me at first until you get patroling under control. And then on your own." "Are we always hungry?" asked Fred Williams, taking another apple. "It helps. The government would like us to be permanently at the point of death, but that is fortunately impractical. The less hold our bodies have, the easier it is to go out. There's one other point, though. And since you're coming with me on your training, I'd prefer you to know--no matter what the rules say. Whenever you go near another living being in a Dive, your mind can see the other mind, and you can read it from the pictures in it. It's difficult to describe, but you'll see for yourself. And if the mind you are looking at is connected up to a body, as we are now, and if the pictures don't seem to fit the situation, you can take it that they refer to events still in the future as far as that body is concerned. The mind has a different space-time existence from the body, obviously, and quite often it is ahead in time. That's why we have to be negative Psi. Anyone can Dive, but only a negative Psi can remain objective about other beings' minds. A Psi would collect other minds' contents and get them confused with his own--future and present all messed up, full of symbols--take a look at a Psi's mind sometime on the way back. There are a lot of accidental roamers around on Earth." "If we can read other minds," Fred Williams said thoughtfully, "then we Divers could have a hell of a lot of power." He was surprised when Pat laughed. "We all think of that," she said, "but so did the Solar Government. We have a bunch of Psis and Security troops tracing us all the time when we're in the body. But the real hold on us is not that. How would you feel if you were told you could never Dive again?" "I--I wouldn't like that."