<p>When Fabius Bile is attacked by daemons aboard his frigate Versalius, he is surprised to be rescued by an old friend, one of his very first experiments. It has ever been the Apothecary's desire to improve mankind, to render them hardy enough to endure in a galaxy of pain and war. Such desires have often led to abominations created by Bile's own hand, and enemies too numerous to list. This creation, Mesuline, though ostensibly an ally, bears a cryptic message, one that could bode ill or well f...