Hoping to impart greater social skills upon its premier simulacrum, the British Admiralty commissions a new engine for the automatized commander, but the engine exceeds all expectation, imparting upon the captain’s innerworkings a passionate love of art, an excessive appreciation of beauty, and an untoward affection toward a member of the merfolk nobility. The simulacrum escapes the bonds of its prior directives in hopes of a life with the beautiful mistress of the kraken, but her abode proves incompatible with his own physique. With the Admiralty seeking the return of their most valuable device, the simulacrum sets out to find the solution that will at last unite him with his love.