The plague servants' faith in Father Nurgle, however, made them bold. They ran readily to their deaths on the end of the Iron Hands' chainswords in order to further the Plague Lord's plans. The Space Marines cut down their foetid attackers like stalks of corn.

The Iron Hands were accompanied by the tech-guard troopers of Captain Skon Thrask's Squad Alpha. At their arrival, the generarium's defenders rallied, drawing on new reserves of strength and stamina, born of hope and determination. Amongst them were the beleaguered survivors of Squads Delta and Epsilon, from the ordinatus's own defence force. Despite their own advanced augmentations, and their valiant attempt to hold back the tide of the invading Chaos forces, the numbers ranged against them had appeared insurmountable. Now it seemed, however, that victory might very well be plucked from the steel jaws of defeat.

But there were other things here too that presented more of a challenge to the seventeen remaining Iron Hands. At the core a contingent of Death Guard Plague Marines had coordinated the capture of Generarium Primus. With the primary generator complex under their control, the Death Guard could bring about the destruction of Ordinatus Gehenna in its entirely if they so desired, if that was indeed their intention.

The miasma of death and putrefaction was even heavier here. The recycled air was thick with the all-pervading essence of evil. Other things were moving amongst the leprous rabble, things that had no right to even exist: the sickly physical manifestation of the Plague Lord's gifts, their long-fingered touch granting their victims those same gifts with virulent efficiency.

Iron-Father Gdolkin carried out a swift scan of the chamber to assess the situation.

'Captain Thrask.’ he said, flicking open the channel to the Iron Hands' tech-guard allies with a synapse-thought. 'If we can get you and your men to that command tower, will you be able to restore operation of the generarium to the bridge?'

W-We can try.’ Thrask replied uncertainly.

'You can try?’ Gdolkin challenged, not liking the doubt in the tech-guard's voice. Doubt implied weakness and weakness led inevitably to failure.

'Put it this way. It'll be the best chance we have if great Gehenna is to complete its mission in time.’

Then so be it. Your objective is to climb that tower and restore control of the generarium to the bridge.’ Gdolkin stated coldly. There would be no debating the matter.

And with that the Iron Hands threw themselves at the enemy again, bolter, chainsword, axe and fist laying waste to the heretics before them.

With a cry of, 'For Ferrus and Medusa!' Librarian Melchor, his bald head and psy-sensitive hood crackling with lambent lightning, turned on a Plague Marine with slime dripping from its breathing tube and, in a blaze of magnesium bright light, obliterated the disease-ridden abomination with a single blast of thought.

Sergeant Erastus and Battle-Brother Taudis gunned down a heretic censer-bearer, his robes daubed with mind-warping sigils that spoke of new and traitorous allegiances. The smoking censer shattered on the iron floor of the chamber in a cloud of foul green fumes that choked the stale, ozone-tinged air.