Bingo Bango!

"Okay, so where was I?" Natsumi asked, crossing her arms. She tipped her head back, and she thought back to the story she had been telling.

There was meeting the Ferrywoman.

Being told she had immortality, powers, and defied destiny.

Then Big Dumbo floating above her demanding that she be terminated right then and there.

Blah, blah, blah.

She bobbled her head back and forth as she caught her own brain up with the details of the story.

"You were about to get your butt handed to you..." Catherine said, as she leaned against the table eager to hear more.

"Right, how could I forget?"

---

The Ophanim, Big Dumbo, did as Natsumi suggested. He slowly descended from up high in the sky and made his way towards the dock. Indeed, he put himself right up in her face until she could see her own reflection in the wet of his iris.

As Big Dumbo descended, Natsumi could make out the surface of the rings surrounding the main eye of the Ophanim.

It was gross.

From a distance, it appeared smooth and matte. She didn't really give much thought to how the ring of eyes worked. What material were they made of? Now, up close she could see the pores and dents in the fleshy rings. Also, there were errant pieces of hair sticking out of it like wildgrass on a lumpy leather prairie.

The eyes were glossy and wet-looking as they came into view. The enormous eyeballs in the rings glanced this way and that. But as the eyes lowered from the sky and into her view, they locked their gaze on her.

A semi-circular portion of an eye ring sank beneath the gentle rolling waves of the sea. Bubbles formed on the water's surface and mixed with the foam and waves. Natsumi caught one of the eyes twitching and shaking as it plunged into the water. She traced the eye up and around the ring, but since they were all so distant from her she couldn't see them from the front, only behind. Yet the entire ring appeared to wobble every so slightly. Natsumi knew that if she tried to open her eyes under water, it would hurt. She imagined that the many eyes on the submerged ring would have been shut up tightly.

Above them, like a fleet of war planes, a group of smaller beings fwoosh'ed by in a tight 'V' formation and then spread out going in opposite directions circling back overhead of the Ophanim and forming a halo around him.

"IT," the Ophanim hissed. "MUST CEASE TO BE."

"Why did he send you?" Natsumi asked.

"TO SETTLE A LEGAL MATTER WITH THE WOMAN." To Natsumi's left, she felt the Ferrywoman shuffle her weight. The back of the Ferrywoman's hand brushed against her waist.

"And what's that legal matter about?" Natsumi challenged.

"THE EXISTENCE OF IT."

"And what is it?"

"IT IS IT."

"Yeah? And what is it?"

The Ophanim's voice boomed as it grew frustrated with Natsumi's constant questioning. "IT SHOULD NOT SPEAK!!"

"Oh," Natsumi said quietly. "So, by your admission I'm it. And I shouldn't exist! And why is that?"

The rings vibrated and shook. The water around the dock frothed and the turbulence of the shaking eye rings along with the waves mixed together to form a sloshing mess of water.

There was a truth he was keeping to himself, and although Natsumi had more than an inkling, she wanted him to say it.

"IT IS A BLIGHT UPON OUR NATURE!" The Ophanim boomed. The water sloshed under the dock with one mighty push, sending a spray of water up against her dress and hands.

She pressed him in the way a child would by incessantly asking the same question. Was it a form of naivety or malicious trolling in children? Natsumi didn't know, but she knew exactly what she was doing. Big Dumbo's mistake was to hang all his trigger points out in the open. Anyone whose default demeanor was to yell showed all their buttons, and she was happy enough to push them. "...And why is that?"

"THE QUESTIONING WILL CEASE!"

Bingo, bango. Someone just lost it.

Natsumi smirked to herself. "Could it be that my very presence, I dunno..." she threw her hands up. "Maybe... challenges someone? You said, King Dorko was all knowing!"

"HE IS THE ONE TRUE CREATOR OF ALL THINGS. ALL KNOWING AND ALL POWERFUL... AND Y--"

Natsumi snapped her fingers and pointed at the pupil of the eye. "But he's not, is he?"

If Big Dumbo's big dumb eye could get any wider, somehow he was doing it. The rings began to vibrate around him. The eye ring that had sunk into the depths of the water caused it to foam up.

She had got him good and mad. There would be no ignoring her now. All eyes were on her.