The Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster

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.