Aeschylus, Captain of the City Guard of Aegina, knew prayer was as dangerous as poking a hydra with a stick. But after one failure as a guardsman after another, he gave it a shot. Aeschylus asked Ares, the god of war, to send him an old hoplite weary of fighting. What he got was a young soldier on a divine mission. What he got was a mess of messy miracles casting a fog of war over some mysterious events. But that's what he got for praying to the god of war.