The Iliad of the Helios Swarm

By: M. A. Bard

Narrated by: Virtual Voice

The Iliad of the Helios Swarm — (An Songs of the Dyson Swarm)
When law runs on light and love rewrites the ledger, one choice can tilt a civilization.
At a wedding beneath a million steering mirrors, a rogue “apple” crashes the ceremony—a contest-device that demands a mortal verdict. Zeus refuses spectacle and appoints an arbiter: Paris of Ilium. In a nanogarden where matter obeys oaths, Hera promises stewardship, Athena mastery, and Aphrodite a life worth living. Paris chooses desire made honorable—Aphrodite—and a path to Helen.
Helen, Sparta’s diplomat and symbol, meets Paris across policy rooms and the gymnasium and insists on dignity first. By night she chooses departure. Consent ripples across the grids; interceptors switch from kill to shepherd; the world argues names—abduction, rescue, elopement—while a city receives her and the narrative stack catches fire. Menelaus answers with law before lances. Agamemnon mobilizes mirrors and mechs. Hector offers a court to keep war inside rules even as a thousand hulls warm to launch.
And then the “wind” dies. Artemis shuts every drive in the muster and names the price: the high-born courage of a volunteered life, “joining” the Hunt-Net to restore motion. Iphigenia steps forward. In a world where mirrors kneel and ledgers sing, fuel becomes an ethical debt—and payment has a face.
A myth reborn as hard science, this is The Iliad with consent protocols, mirror economics, and godlike systems constrained by quotas. If you crave the sweep of classic epic with the precision of cutting-edge SF—think The Expanse meets Circe by way of Seveneves—start here. Power is policy, excellence is measurable, and the first spark of a siege is about to light the swarm.