It started with one questioner.
Ms. Cheerilee was digressing from her math lesson, just a little bit, as she was explaining to her students how mathematics could be seen in everyday life, in the form of a special ratio. Like how each leg was divided into segments that were in a special ratio to each other, or how a pegasus wing could also be divided into segments that were in said ratio. The little fillies and colts lapped it up, of course, in foal-like wonder which was heartwarming reception to Cheerilee. Like any teacher, she wanted to open her students' eyes and make them question and study the world around them, even if some of their inquiries were simplistic and sometimes downright humorous.
"Is this ratio thingy like, in other living things too?" asked Scootaloo, and Cheerilee nodded.
"Right, fact is, a commonly cited example is the nautilu--"
"What about non-living things like video games?" asked Snips. Cheerilee raised an eyebrow at the question and shook her head.
"No, only living things, Snips, but it is a ratio used in paintings and music by artists to make it somewhat more aesthetically appeal--"
"What about noodles?" asked Snails.
"What about noodles?" answered Cheerilee in response.
"You know, just... noodles."
After a bombardment of questions, many of them nonsensical but quite a few turning out to be genuinely intriguing to the teacher, Ms. Cheerilee insisted on continuing the lesson. Unfortunately, there were but 5 minutes left till the end of class, and so she only managed to breeze through a vague definition of the area of a triangle before the bell rang, signalling the end of school. After personally waving off all of the leaving students, she started packing her saddlebag to go back to her office, looking forward to leaving the empty classroom for a cup of hot tea.
Thing was, the classroom wasn't empty. There was a white filly unicorn still in her seat, her Mathematics exercise book on her table, and she had a hoof on her chin, eyes glued to the surface of her desk. Sensing a troubled mind, Ms. Cheerilee trotted over to her side, attempting elicit the source of Sweetie's troubles.
"Are you alright, Sweetie Belle?" asked Ms. Cheerilee as she flashed Sweetie Belle a smile. The filly looked up at her.
"Um..." started Sweetie Belle.
"You can tell me anything, my little pony. Is it something that I said just now, in class?" asked Ms. Cheerilee.
"Kinda... You see, I was thinking," said Sweetie Belle, and Cheerilee's ears perked up, intent on hearing what she had to say.
"Why is every living thing like... in a perfect ratio? Does that mean that there's something out there that's programming everything to be like that?" asked Sweetie Belle.
Cheerilee froze. She never expected that kind of question from a fun-loving filly like Sweetie Belle. Cheerilee cleared her throat.
"Um, see, Sweetie Belle, we really can't say whether there is or there is not any um... external power--"
"We should!" squeaked Sweetie Belle all of a sudden. Ms. Cheerilee jumped a little, slightly because of her genuine nervousness when it came to topics like this, which were far out of her field.
"I mean..." said Sweetie Belle, "If everything's arranged according to a number... Doesn't that mean that there is, or maybe was, something out there that made everything? Like there's some sort of code that's in everything, and the it's this special ratio thingy..."
Cheerilee couldn't say anything. She knew just as much as Sweetie Belle did on this topic, and was frustrated she couldn't provide anything close to an answer. Cheerilee sunk her head down and shook it.
"Sorry, Sweetie Belle, I can't answer that," responded Cheerilee quite pathetically. But in the heat of the moment, she was quite quick to add something. "I'll be sure to do some research on your question."
"Oh, alright. We should really have more classes like this, Ms. Cheerilee. Thanks," replied Sweetie Belle, finally packing up her notes and dashing out of the room. Cheerilee sighed contently, looking forward to her tea in office and totally forgetting everything about creation and ratios and numbers and--
"Oh, and Ms. Cheerilee?" asked Sweetie Belle as she poked her head in through the door of the classroom. "Don't forget to um, tell me what you researched during the next lesson!"
"Will do!" answered Ms. Cheerilee cheerfully, out of reflex. But soon after the door slammed in her face, she realised that she was resigned to do what Sweetie Belle did; What horrendous effect would it have on Sweetie Belle's spirit of inquiry if she denied answering her question? It would definitely adversely affect Cheerilee, by giving her the horrible guilt of denying a student answers. Cheerilee knew what she had to do, and packed up her bags to find somepony who might know the answers.
It started with a knock.
Twilight was on the carpeted floor of her library*, reading a book entitled "Reading for Dummies." Not that she couldn't read, (which would be severely out of character!) it was just that she'd spent so much time reading that she never got around to understanding the very art of reading itself. To fill up this void of ignorance, she blinked to Canterlot Library using alicorn magic and was nearly frothing at the mouth when she searched the library catalogs and finally found and borrowed it. She was ending the chapter that touched on rudimentary explanations and analogies to elucidate Equestrian Alphabet when she heard the knock. Though usually oblivious to door knocks, Twilight was trying to shake off the bad habit of not answering her guests over a book. But the book was so intriguing!
"Spike! Get the door!" shouted Twilight. She heard the plodding of dragon feet across the second level, but didn't hear them descend the stairs.
"Twilight, we've talked about this," answered Spike. "I get the door all the time for you."
"B-but this book is soooo good!" replied Twilight.
"You always use that as an excuse, Twilight! It's like every book you read is interesting, even the exact same books with different covers," replied Spike. Twilight raised a hoof but realised that she had nothing good to say. The knocking came back.
"Fine, Spike," answered Twilight, irritation in her tone as she did so, putting her book down gingerly and trotting to the door. A quick peek through the eyehole identified the knocker as Cheerilee, and Twilight immediately opened the door to let her long-time friend in.
"How do you do, Ms. Cheerilee?" asked Twilight as she led the schoolhouse teacher into the library. Cheerilee smiled widely.
"I'm fine, thanks, Twilight. You see, I've come here to ask you a question which... I think could be quite disturbing," said Cheerilee, the smile on her face drooping a little, but remaining a smile nonetheless. Twilight raised an eyebrow as both mares found their places around the kitchen table, the two mares across from each other and sitting on chairs.
"Disturbing? How so?" asked Twilight.
"Well, you might not be able to come up with an answer to it," replied Cheerilee.
"Is it Big Mac-related?" asked Twilight, a little slyly. Cheerilee blushed madly.
"No! How'd you come to that?" answered Cheerilee, and Twilight just chuckled.
"You create way too many problems with the guy. He's just trying to buck apples and make a living in peace," said Twilight.
"Assuming peace can be had in PonyVille. Anyway, to the question itself. See, in class today, I was talking with Sweetie Belle after giving a uh... talk on the Golden Ratio. You know, nature's number?" said Cheerilee, to which Twilight nodded, a little relieved that this question was venturing into a field familiar to her.
"So, she was thinking, if every living thing can be divided by a ratio in one way or another, does that mean there was a code, a uh...signature of some sort, namely the Golden Ratio, that was branded on them from some other higher power? Since every living thing, regardless of genus, phylum, family or kingdom shares this number in them in one way or another, doesn't that mean all living things were created by some... higher being?"
Twilight had never, ever heard a notion that Equestria could have been created by a 'higher being'. The idea was absurd; even Celestia accepted the idea of Evolution, that the three races of ponies had existed separately once and developed their unique characteristics in their own respective continents through natural selection, a process that took generations. Twilight shook her head vigorously in disagreement, but was intent on making conversation civil.
"Sorry, Cheerilee, but I just can't accept that theory. I mean, there is so much more evidence pointing towards evolution, so really--"
"But you can't just put it down!" Cheerilee nearly cried out. "I mean, the mathematics is there. You said it to me once, that math is the way to explain the illogical. If you can't refute it, why label it as disproved?"
Twilight was quite stunned, but didn't try to show any of it.
"Alright, Cheerilee," said Twilight, a headache coming onto her wracked mind as she tried to maintain her composure. "So you're positing, that there COULD, and that is a very large could, have been a creator of everything and all things?"
"Maybe. But it shouldn't be dismissed so quickly, in my opinion..." said Cheerilee, though she herself looked a little uncertain.
"If that is the truth, then there will be many inconsistencies with the evidence we have dug up in the past that suggest evolution and support it greatly! Do you actually believe in this?"
"Woah, Twilight, absolutely not. Evolution is... quite truthfully, the truth. But I wasn't really thinking along the lines of evolution. But, how could the very first, simplest lifeforms come into being and be sentient? After all, Demarecritus did say that all things are made of indivisible particles, which are lifeless and whose motions are determined by physics. So..." said Cheerilee, a little more confident of herself. Twilight didn't respond, her eyes closed in concentration as she tried to remember a book that could have the needed information.
"Ah! Put it this way," said Cheerilee almost excitedly, after a long moment of uncomfortable silence. "It's like saying, give an illiterate pony a book called "Reading for Dummies" and you'll see how ineffective that is, since there can't be a result when the 'ingredients' for reading aren't there in the first place. There's a great hole evolution hasn't filled: it is assuming that life came up from the lifeless, or that ponies could read without reading--"
"ALRIGHT!" cried Twilight, as she spread her wings in fury at the insinuations that Cheerilee was making. "I'm done with what you're trying to say, however, as a friend, I'm willing to ask Princess Celestia herself on whether she knows how Equestria started. Really, I've never asked her that question before, and I can't expect a good answer, even from her. But, I'll still see what I can do, as a friend, and fellow inquirer into the origin of the world," said Twilight. But deep down, it was this lack of satisfaction in Twilight that wanted her to find something concrete for her own argument to stand on, to completely debunk the illogic being presented to her by Cheerilee. The purple-coated teacher smiled, nonetheless, at Twilight despite the librarian's annoyance and showed herself out of the library.
"Alright, thank you Twilight. It is very important that I get the information to Sweetie Belle, it's a sort of... teacher's obligation to answer all questions the best we can. Oh! And do present your findings to me after you're done, you do know where I stay," said Cheerilee, before she hurried out. Twilight scratched her head with her hoof and using her horn, extracted a bottle of headache pills and downed four pills with a great helping of water. Then, she picked up "Reading for Dummies" and stashed it away into the restricted section of the library.
It all started with a *poof*.
Which was exactly what Celestia heard when she was at her desk, writing some letters to Saddle Arabian ministers. Of course, Celestia had to communicate with the Saddle Arabian people on a daily basis because they were very important business partners. As to what business it was, it was highly confidential among the princesses, which led to conspiracy theories to be made; one postulated that Celestia could be planning to build a contraption, maybe a doomsday device or a magical prison, in a joint project with the Saddle Arabians since they certainly had the resources to build such machines. But these theories were formed by the minority of the population who thought that Celestia was a tyrant.
*poof* it went, and Celestia turned behind to locate the source of the *poof*ing. Half expecting Cadence or Luna, she found out that it was none other than the Princess of Magic, Twilight Sparkle herself. As a close friend, Celestia smiled warmly at Twilight's appearance.
"How do you do, Twilight?" inquired Celestia calmly as she left her desk to talk with Twilight properly. Usually when Twilight was visiting it was for an urgent matter or emergency. This time, there was something off about the librarian; The look in her eyes was wild with fury, and she looked ready to pounce at Celestia or sink her teeth into her pristine, slender neck. Something to that effect.
"Princess! How exactly did life on Equestria start?" asked Twilight without so much as an "I'm fine" to answer Celestia's greeting. Celestia blinked too times, then stared at Twilight.
"What?" asked Celestia again. It was out of the blue that she'd even ask anything of anyone, since Twilight usually tried finding a book to solve her own problems. However, she didn't blame Twilight on this specific question.
"You heard me. How was life on Equestria conceived?"
"All... right," said Celestia slowly as Twilight stood firm, her mind ready for the receiving of a mind-blowing fact or story of creation. Celestia cleared her throat and placed a hoof to her chin in deep thought, aware that Twilight was staring her down. After a full minute of silence and thought, Celestia opened her mouth to speak to an anticipating Twilight.
"I don't know," Celestia said.
"...what?"
"I don't know," answered Celestia quite confidently. Twilight's initial heavy breathing still maintained, though her face softened for a brief moment, somewhat.
Then her horn lit up and her eyes glowed menacingly, and Twilight started to rise up with the influence of her magic as Celestia backed down in surprise, never seeing Twilight deliberately acting violent towards her in their long relationship.
"You're older than time itself, and it still ISN'T clear to you in the slightest?" asked Twilight in a voice more mutated and louder than the Royal Canterlot Voice, energies in the shades of a rainbow's colour gathering around her and causing papers and books in Celestia's study to fly around the room. Celestia held up a brave front, not wanting any pony to be hurt; not herself, but the residents of Canterlot who could easily be harmed by Twilight's magic even from the highest floor of Canterlot Castle.
"That's my answer and I'm sticking with it, Twilight," retorted Celestia, though her voice was barely audible in the soup of alicorn magic that was being gathered around Twilight. Celestia knew that Twilight was a rare type of pony who hungered for knowledge, but she didn't know that she did so to such a... fanatical extent.
"You're hiding the answer, I KNOW IT!" answered Twilight as her glowing eyes swept across the room, levitating papers to her face and scanning them thoroughly in the blink of an eye. Celestia was growing concerned at the great level of magical energies that Twilight was harnessing, that could be hard even for the Element of Magic herself to control. Twilight's purple aura of magic that was enveloping her was intensifying, and some of Celestia's papers were incinerating at the very touch of Twilight's magic.
"Twilight! STOP!" yelled Celestia, but the aura covered Twilight completely in an opaque purple sheen that outlined her body, and a large, big bang resounded throughout the entirety of Canterlot as everything in the room from the centre of the resulting explosion was strewn around the room or outside the window onto the streets below. The sun alicorn shook her head as the door to her study opened suddenly, revealing two unicorn guards.
"Princess!" the two of them said simultaneously, swords unsheathed at the ready.
"No..." said Celestia, head drooped down grimly as she could not bear to look at the remains of Twilight's explosion, which was represented on the floor by clear ground surrounded by black streaks that jutted out radially from the centre, and left a room full of torn and strewn papers and books.
Twilight found herself on her back on a cold floor, with numerous, faraway voices assailing her headache-wracked mind. She lifted her hands... Hands? Before she could do so much as scream, she heard a rapping on a door, followed by an impatient voice.
"Hey! You've been in there for hours!" came a grating male voice, and Twilight's eyes flung right open. She looked around, and found out that she was lying beside a toilet in a cubicle. She hurriedly stood up and awkwardly hit the knob a few times before finally wrapping her fingers around the knob. Then, she took a few more minutes twisting, pulling and pushing it before getting the door to budge. She flung the door open, to be met with a large man with an irritated expression. He had a fedora on his head and a trench coat wrapping his large body and his neck was rather hairy, with short hair covering his double chin and he had glasses on. Upon seeing Twilight, his expression turned into one of awe, and he placed his fingers to the edge of his fedora and tipped it to her.
"M'... M'lady," the man breathed out, the stench of old cheese in his breath detectable from afar. "To whom do I owe this pleasure of sharing this toilet with?"
"... Sorry?" said Twilight, a little confused by now.
"I am most honoured," said the man. "And it would make me euphoric in many moments should you be m'lady in this Atheists' Convention."
"I'm sorry, but I'm not interested... I don't even know why I'm here!" said Twilight, and at this, the man's expression turned to anger.
"You slut! Whore!" cried the man, as he pushed past Twilight to the toilet cubicle, curious orange flakes coming off of his trench coat and staining Twilight's clothing. The toilet cubicle door shut with a bang. "Go wed the men of your choice, but I assure you, they will not be gentlesirs like me and you shall regret it when you bear their whore children!"
"... what?" said Twilight uncertainly, before hearing the door to the restroom open and a black man barged in. He was short and plump with a business suit on but thankfully he didn't have a fedora on his head. The man took out a colander and placed it Twilight's head.
"No time to explain," said the black man, as his hand reached out and dragged Twilight out of the restroom, on the way removing his blazer and placing it on her shoulders.
"Name's Neil. Just call me Neil," said the black man. "I'm an astrophysicist, and a scientist like you, Twilight."
"What? How do you know my name? And I'm not a scientist!"
"I can smell one from a mile away. And it has been statistically proven that 95 percent of female scientists have purple skin," said Neil, as they entered a small, white-walled room with a stage facing several rows of chairs, on which there were seated many large men in fedoras. Twilight was surprised that Neil could smell her inner scientist in such a foul-smelling room full of fedora-clad men who obviously abhorred the shower. Neil had her hand in his, and his left hand was on Twilight's colander, ensuring that it stayed on. It seemed that the colander was a sort of camouflage that deflected the attention of the large men. The men stared at the pair only for the briefest of moments before they went back to their business, which was a range of activities like drinking a drink called 'Mountain Dew', eating from a pack of goodies called 'Doritos' or clicking away at laptops. Twilight and Neil sat themselves down at a back row of seats, and the whole room was in silence as everyone seemed to be waiting for something.
Suddenly, there was a large, sharp wave of microphone feedback that filled the room and the men sat up on their foldable plastic chairs. On the stage was a large man, with an appearance not unlike the smelly majority in the room. Twilight sat up in her chair, anticipating the large man's words. He grabbed a microphone with his right hand while he grabbed a towel in his left, wiping the sweat from his brow directly below his fedora.
"Greetings, fellow men," said the man in a high pitched voice. "As the President of Young Adults of New Atheism, I'm proud to introduce a guest speaker today to grace our presence. His name has appeared in many respectable shows, and he has authored and co-authored many books that our people enjoy. We honour him today because he debates the foolish and ignorant so that we don't have to, though we'd willingly debate them since we are fearless, brave, and above all, intelligent atheists capable of holding our ground against religious funDIEs. He's also a scientist, and as we all know, science is--"
"GET ON WITH IT!" shouted Neil, but nobody seemed especially startled by his outburst.
"Fine, fine," said the large man, and his mopped his sweaty brow with his towel yet again. "Laddies and Gentlesirs, I present to you, Sir Richard Dawkins!"
There was tremendous clapping as the large man walked off stage, and his absence was filled by a much thinner man, with a mop of unkempt white hair on his head and a dapper suit and tie on himself. He had on a pair of glasses and carried with him a book, entitled 'The God Delusion'. Around her, Twilight could see the large men breathing heavily, their expressions of awe transfixed onto the sight of the elderly man as if he was Princess Celestia herself.
Richard Dawkins was unsmiling as he grabbed a microphone, then realising that it was sweaty, extracted a towel from his back pocket and enclosed the microphone's handle in it.
"Greetings, fellow atheists," said Richard Dawkins as the men stared at Dawkins in silence, clinging onto his every word. "I am quite honoured that all of you could find the time today to come, since the youngsters of our generation should be very engrossed nowadays with educating themselves about nature and going out of their homes out of their love for science to visit places and people who share similar interests and fervour for discovery. After all, atheists are the master race."
This was followed by immense clapping, and Twilight was starting to feel uncomfortable. Such distinctions between atheists and non-atheists weren't apparent nor were they enforced in PonyVille.
"However, I have... immensely grave news," said Richard Dawkins, and the congregation collectively hushed their applause for his words. "Or rather, good news for me, personally, but to the rest, it might be a bit of a shock. See, I've taken it upon myself to read some religious documents; no, not your run-of-the-mill Bible or Quran, but something... more. You see, I've been in doubt, as scientists usually are... but now, I think... In this moment, I have... become euphoric."
A large gasp rippled through the crowd, and many of the men tipped their fedoras to Dawkins, and much applause followed.
"You see, I've been given a scientific explanation, and I think I know how the world works now. It was created by this!" Richard Dawkins lifted his copy of 'The God Delusion' and removed the cover, to reveal that it was actually the 'Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster'. The large men gasped in shock, and some of them started frothing at the mouth at the article of religious ignorance that was presented before them. Some of them stood up and tried to leave the room, but the exits were locked, plus their palms were too sweaty to effectively twist doorknobs.
"Listen, fellow atheists," said Dawkins. "I only said that I became euphoric over this. I am still an atheist. The beauty about this religion, is that it rejects dogma outright but it actually is correct! See, I've often cited the Flying Spaghetti Monster as an example against a God, because I can claim that a God, or Zeus, or Apollo exists but no one can disprove it, but that doesn't mean I'm right. That is Russell's Teapot, in essence. But I'm convinced that the FSM is the way, the truth and the life because God doesn't real, but the process of flying, the food that is spaghetti, and the entities we call monsters do in fact real. Therefore, the FSM is real!"
The large men started grinning yellow-toothed smiles and they tipped their fedoras so deeply until they bent over where they stood. Neil was shaking his head at this, but Twilight was awed at the power of this religion, that it could sway over the most prestigious, unconvinced scientist to seek refuge under its wing. However, there was something that was especially irksome; it was how these so called 'atheists' accepted this without so much as a question.
Meanwhile, Dawkins pulled out a colander from the back of the stage and placed it on his head.
"From now on, we are all Pastafarians, and we will emulate the FSM's chosen People, the Pirates! Arrgh!" cried Dawkins as he placed an eye-patch on himself and took out some colanders from the back of the stage to distribute to his fellow atheists, and all of them willingly let their fedoras fall to the floor with resounding thuds as they gave in to the FSM. Twilight stood up to object, but in the process she let her colander fall to the floor, revealing her feminine self. Neil looked up in horror and mouthed the word 'run'.
"M'Lady!" came the near immediate response to this as the large men located Twilight. Thankfully, Twilight's human body was a physically fit one and she was able to run into the restroom and lock it before the swarm of large men could barge in. Outside, there were shouts of 'Give this one gentle sir a chance' and 'Friendzoned yet again!' but her mind power focused entirely on blinking herself out of this wacky world; she hoped that she had her alicorn magic at her disposal. She felt feathery appendages grow on her back and ears sprout out from the top of her head (not as gross as it seems!) and her hair growing in length as she found her element, magic. Soon, the restroom disappeared, and Twilight was flying through a tunnel that cut through dimensions.
After a few moments, rabid, sweaty and smelly neck beards found their way into the restroom. Richard Dawkins asked for all of them to stand aside to let him pass, and they did so whilst tipping their colanders in his general direction. He looked into the cubicles, and found one to be blackened with soot. Though it seemed like the girl had escaped without a trace other than the soot, upon closer inspection, there was a swirling technicolor portal that was quickly closing up. Without thinking, he stepped through, not knowing where it'd take him, leaving a restroom full of confused neck beards.
