There is a ship that sails the darkest ocean
O’er shoreless seas beyond the reach of tide.
She is the Starship the mighty Retribution
And her laser ports are four meters wide.

Her crew’s the pick of many nations,
They’ve studied war as every soldier should.
Universal peace their aim and dedication
And their aim is particularly good.

The captain’s name is Esther Morgen,
A lady born to rule between the stars.
Venus is her namesake, Star of Morning –
But her god is duty, his name is Mars.

Lifting from a berth at High Woomera,
Bending for the Universe’s rim,
Seeking out the enemy solara,
Their chances of return are none and slim.

Chorus:
Forged in space for a dreadful fate
The Retribution is Earth’s solution
For a foe they’ve learned to hate.
Spark and glow and lightnings flow
Let the engines burn for there’s no return
Now watch the Earthmen’s legend grow

Light years from Earth klaxons are calling,
Five Bogies sighted off the starship’s bow.
Take your battle station, free-falling,
Spaceman, your destiny is now.

Captain Morgen’s voice is savage,
Her will is iron, her mind is steel.
Before she begins the carnage,
She tells the Bogies how she feels.

“You bastards raped our planet,
A hundred years ago and more,
But now we’re here and damn it,
We’re going to even up the score.”

The sergeants share a kind of wisdom,
Of Earth and mission both together
“Don’t know much ‘cept where we’re from.
C’mon, you apes! You want to live forever?”

Chorus

Retribution’s lasers concentrate
On one Bogie ship, each at a time.
Her job is really a trap to bait.
Terra’s tactics are almost a crime....

The Bogie beams are hotter, faster;
Their armor forged from neutron stars.
Bogie cyborg ships flash past her:
Earth’s best hope is marked with scars.

Yes, but the Retribution is a giant,
Six thousand meters long and near so wide.
It seems strange yet I ain’t lying —
She’s mostly empty space inside.

While the Bogies try to slay her,
Leaner, meaner, each time she grows.
Damage makes her shed another layer,
And her surface turns to shrapnel when it blows.

Chorus

Even the wreckage is a weapon,
And taking damage just another ploy.
The enemy is going to learn a lesson,
Never trust a Terran girl or boy!

The Bogies slow to turn and pound her,
Staggered, the Earthborn ship careens,
But now rings of singleships surround her,
Each manned by a zombie Space Marine!

(No energy can the little ships be showing,
No heat, no spark, no Bogie gauges flashing red.
No heartbeat, no thought can they be knowing,
All these warriors have been frozen dead.)

(Cold as space, the singleships lie quiet,
Silent as night’s endless cave.
When the signal comes then – Riot!
Space Marines will rise from the grave!)

Chorus

Sometimes they called her The Onion.
And as a joke, that’s rather rich.
But the crew of the Starship Retribution
Enjoy another: “Payback’s a Bitch!”

Terran lasers can’t mar Bogie armor.
Only enemy sensors offer targets.
A full broadside it takes to harm her…
(Dead Marines can’t hope no one forgets.)

(Silent still the zombies waiting.)
Two Bogie ships are blinded and collide,
Three-to-one the odds abating,
(Hard to measure when Death is on your side.)

The last false deck is shattered,
Stripped to her core Payback still stands,
Ship and crew are bruised and battered,
But it’s time to activate her plans.

Chorus

Higgs bosons can be steered with gamma flux,
Pile enough up and they implode,
The quantum black hole made really sucks
But for energy, it’s the mother lode.

Put a hefty charge on hot nothing,
Handle with magnets and much care.
Feed it hydrogen or something,
It’s so tiny it’s only maybe there!

Spin it fast enough so Einstein’s dizzy,
Kerr-Newman equations say not to shirk.
The event horizon is so busy,
De Broglie waves do all the work.

The Payback’s engines, that’s how they artificed them,
They cost a mint and seven of Neptune’s moons.
Now the time is come to sacrifice them,
Throw’em out and watch’em go boom!

Chorus

The engine-torpedoes stop at nothing,
Everything before them is just fuel.
If the Bogies were not less than something,
Doing this to them would be cruel.

Two more of the enemy are hell bound,
Squeezed right out of this universe.
(Undead Marines never make a sound.)
For the last Bogie they saved the best for worst.

Now the signal from the Payback
Lights a fire in each Marine.
(Caution! Frozen Jarheads! Stay Back!)
Resurrection is a scream!

Four thousand singleships are too much
For even Bogie technology
Gamma lasers, neutron armor and such
No match for the Zombie spree!

Chorus

Neutron armor has a weakness,
Soft as dairy butter it seems.
Entrenching tools are weapons, best
In the hands of Zombie Space Marines!

And gamma lasers are no use
When 100 singleships will sacrifice
Themselves. They’re on Hell-Juice!
All are burned to vapor in a trice.

And now the Bogie lasers are but dust,
The Zombies land beneath the guns
Their helmets bear a slogan: Dig We Must!
A spadeful of Bogie armor weighs many tons.

It takes less skill and more muscle,
Far from Earth, the undead brigades
Make a hole in the Bogie hull.
They’ve died before, now they’ll die with spades.

Chorus

The remnant of the Retribution
Shrunken to hardly more than a speck
Sends their last and final weapon --
A boarding party launches toward the wreck.

Captain Morgen leads from the fore
She’s beaten the Bogie Fleet
But her fighting heart wants still more
Not treasure but data would be sweet!

(Four thousand dead Marines leave her numb.)
The commander still wants knowledge
Where are these Bogies coming from?
And into the haunted hulk she’ll trudge.

Home’s so far away it might be legend
Never to see blue sky again some day
Their mission has reached its final end.
But their Ol’ Onion made the Bogies pay.

Tumult and tempest sent Terra’s best
Raging ‘gainst enemy stars
They made a start, found the Bogies’ heart
Waging the Mutha of all wars!

Forged in space for a dreadful fate
The Retribution was Earth’s solution
For a foe they’d learned to hate.
Sparks did glow and lightning flow
Let the engines burn, there was no return
And still the Earthmen’s legends grow

Homeward they sent their hard-won knowledge,
Not enough ship or fuel to take them, too.
They couldn’t live for long in the wreckage,
The Bogie ship, now a tombstone for the crew.

With death and steel and tricks on their side,
They won their first battle against our Bogie foe.
Somewhere out there they fought and died,
To send back what Terra needed so.

With their deaths they bought Earth a tomorrow
Four thousand zombies and two thousand crew.
Their story will be sung with pride and sorrow
We’ll sing it on the Bogie homeworld, too.

There is a fleet that sails the darkest ocean,
O’er shoreless seas beyond the reach of tide.
Fifty-one ships bigger than Retribution
And their laser ports are twelve meters wide!