The Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster

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.