The Asymptote of Kallio

“A three-centuries-old signal carries the autopsy report of a corpse. The dead man's tag bears his own serial number.”

Moored at the rim of the Kallio-B gravity well, outpost Nadir-04 groans every time it nears periastron. There, technician Teodor Kask picks up a telemetry packet lost three centuries ago: the forensic record of a corpse from the first prospecting run, with an arrhythmia identical to his own and a service tag that carries his serial number, flaw and all. With Dr. Sofia Lem on his side and Strand, the commissioner, checking every dump, Teodor will have to decide whether to cut the cable or read the file to the end.