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Everyone knows that crafty Odysseus came up with the idea for the Trojan Horse, which allowed the Greeks to sneak into Troy and finally win the Trojan War. What's less discussed is where he got the idea. It's generally politely dismissed as being an inspiration of the gods. Athena, maybe. She likes him.
Actually, like a lot of good ideas, the good part came from a kid.
Odysseus was walking around the Greek camp with Epeus, discussing gods, sacrifices, prophecies, and how to win this war already so they could go home. This was supposed to be quick and easy. Instead, the gods got involved (or perhaps just more involved), and half the Trojan males between the ages of sixteen and sixty turned out to be legendary fighters, and really there was only so long the family back home was going to be satisfied with the occasional postcard, having a bloody time, sorta glad you aren't here. Epeus, who was a bit of a carpenter, wanted to build something really big and impressive that would get the gods' attention.
"Big won't do much good on its own," Odysseus pointed out. "Not if it's just wood."
"We could put something in it to make it...shit. What if it were really big?" Epeus suggested half-heartedly. He kicked at the dust. "They'd probably just burn it down. Fuckin' Trojans."
Odysseus shrugged. "We'd have to convince them...huh. Wait a second."
"What?" said Epeus, but Odysseus was hunkered down next to a little kid. The boy was sitting by one of the tents, playing with a wooden horse that had a couple feathers stuck in its back. He'd built a tiny wall of pebbles and sand, and was sailing the horse back and forth over it.
"It's Pegasus," the kid explained happily to the man who'd asked so nicely. "He's taking Bellerephon into Troy, and he can kick all their butts!"
Odysseus thanked the kid, told him to be careful, then stood up. Epeus eyed his expression warily. He wasn't one of Odysseus's close friends, but really you didn't need to be a close friend to know that particular expression. "Uh..."
"All we need," Odysseus said softly, "is to get inside the wall."
"Well, no shit," Epeus said after a minute, when it became apparent that Odysseus was waiting for a response. "We've only been trying to do that for--"
"That offering you were talking about," Odysseus said. "How big could you build it?"
"Pretty big. Why?"
And the rest, as they say, was history.
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