I participated in the development of EVA

"it is good."

Although he was reluctant, he still agreed.

The three of them stood up and left the office and walked towards the closed incubation room.

After passing through three sealed doors before entering, Fumihiko Ikari once again saw the scene that was lingering in his mind.

In a room the size of a football field, there are incubation devices, and inside them are clones of Rei Ayanami. The slender doll-like girls are floating quietly in the LCL liquid. These clones show Rei Ayanami at different ages due to different batches of cloning. The oldest has grown to thirteen years old, and the youngest looks only about four or five years old.

They have been living in an incubator like a mother's womb since they were born... no! From the moment they were born.

Therefore, their hair has never been taken care of, and even the youngest clones' hair is already very long.

They were very quiet, like lifeless dolls, with only their chests rising and falling due to their liquid breathing and their soft long hair swaying due to the flow of liquid liquid, proving that they were alive.

Fumihiko Ikari has a trauma about this place, so he has been deliberately avoiding it.

It was not until now that he noticed that the condition of these clones was worse than he had imagined. If the hair of some of the clones was not trimmed, they would most likely inhale their hair when breathing in the future. Liquid breathing puts a heavy burden on the body, so each breath requires more effort than normal breathing. Therefore, this worry is not impossible.

In addition, the impact of these pure white ketone bodies is indeed quite great.

Those clones that are still young are fine, with sexual characteristics not yet beginning to develop, while those that are a little older have initial development.

He's not a pedophile, he just thinks it's not a good thing.

Although these clones have no self-awareness and their existence is between life and death, they don't care about this at all, but he feels that they should still be given the respect they deserve.

wrong!

It's not about giving, it's about enjoying the respect that you deserve.

Compared to Ikari Fumihiko, the other two looked much calmer, after all, this scroll was created by them.

230. Like Weeds

There are corresponding equipment in the incubator, but it needs to be debugged.

Fumihiko Ikari and Yui Ikari watched silently as Dr. Ito debugged the equipment.

Bored, Fumihiko Ikari looked at the surrounding incubation equipment again, and an idea emerged in his mind.

Their lives are like weeds.

At this time, Ikari Yui suddenly asked a question.

"Are they using the debugging potion now?"

She didn't pay much attention to the situation in the incubator. After all, there was nothing worth paying attention to here.

Because of the trauma from the past, Fumihiko Ikari deliberately ignored everything in the incubator.

"This place has always been managed by Dr. Ito."

Ikari Yui was a little surprised.

"You care so much about Ayanami Rei, I thought you were the one managing this place."

Fumihiko Ikari did not tell anyone about the psychological trauma he had with this place, because even if he told her such things, Yui Ikari would not understand. If she could understand, none of this would be happening now.

"They should be replaced! If the debugging potion hadn't been used, they would be almost the same age as Ritsuko now."

Ikari Yui was stunned for a moment.

"Ritsuko?"

Obviously, he had no impression of the name Ritsuko, but he quickly realized it.

"Is this Ritsuko the daughter of Dr. Akagi?"

It's not that she remembered Ritsuko Akagi's name, but that in the R&D department, excluding Rei Ayanami, there was only one half-grown child, Ritsuko Akagi. The two of them had actually come into contact with each other quite a few times. The reason why she had no impression of Ritsuko Akagi was very simple. The current Ritsuko Akagi herself was not worth her attention.

There was no need to dwell on these things, but instead he made an estimate in his mind and corrected the mistakes in Ikari Fumihiko's words.

"They should be older than her. According to the original data, the oldest of them should be about your age now."

Ikari Fumihiko naturally knew that Ikari Yui was talking about these things just to extend the shelf life of this batch of cloned bodies.

Yui Ikari is a rational person.

Although the soul injection project is more important, the possibility of Rei Ayanami piloting multiple EVAs will not be given up.

There was a pause before he spoke again.

"How many clones are there here?"

"About five hundred?"

Ikari Yui doesn't remember this very clearly.

Ikari Fumihiko was silent again.

Five hundred...

The number was a little more than he expected.

Seeing that Ikari Fumihiko didn't want to talk, Ikari Yui came to an incubation device and looked at the cloned bodies floating inside, just like looking in a mirror.

The clone is very similar to her when she was young, with only minor differences.

Uh--

Well, the difference is more than just in appearance.

And physical development.

At this age, her development level was lower than that of the clone.

At the same time, she felt a little embarrassed. The cloned body was too similar to herself as a child, which made her feel as if her own body was displayed to Ikari Fumihiko without reservation. However, this strange feeling came and went quickly. No matter how similar the cloned body looked to herself as a child, it was not herself.

Of course, the reason I was able to get rid of this strange feeling so quickly was because I had had this feeling when I was studying cloning research.

At this time, Dr. Ito finally debugged the equipment.

"Debugged."

Upon hearing this, the two men put away their thoughts and came to the testing equipment.

Dr. Ito opened an incubation device and wanted to move the clones onto the device.

"Uh, who of you two can help me?"

The test is naturally to test the first batch of cloned bodies, so that the observed data will be more accurate.

Dr. Ito is old and lacks exercise on a daily basis, so it is difficult for him to carry the cloned body by himself.

Ikari Yui set his eyes on Ikari Fumihiko, obviously asking Ikari Fumihiko to help.

Fumihiko Ikari did not refuse. He walked forward and picked up the clone who seemed to be sleeping. It was lighter than expected, with messy long hair dragging on the floor. At this moment, he realized that the clone's hair was at least two meters long. In order to prevent it from being stepped on during transportation, he put it down and covered it with the hair as a sheet, then picked it up again.

Halfway through, he suddenly stopped.

Ikari Yui's expression became strange, and she was obviously suspecting that Ikari Fumihiko had reacted to the stimulation of the clone's fragile body.

Dr. Ito had similar ideas.

Ikari Fumihiko naturally didn't know the dirty thoughts in the two people's minds, nor did he have such dirty thoughts.

The reason I stopped was that I thought of something.

If problems are detected, will these clones be destroyed as defective products?

If they have no use value, then naturally they have no value in existence. There is no need to waste resources on maintaining their lives.

Equipment maintenance, LCL replacement, power loss, these are all costs.

It is not difficult to see from Ikari Yui's attitude that the top management does not regard these cloned bodies as lives at all. To them, these cloned bodies exist just like spare parts of instruments. When destroying these cloned bodies, the top management may take his thoughts into consideration and not destroy them directly, but they can also create an accidental destruction that they cannot find any problem with.

In the end, he placed the cloned body on the device, but prevented Dr. Ito from activating the device.

"You guys go out, leave this to me."

Terminating now is the best option, but he wants to know the answer.

The two men's expressions became even weirder, and they stared at Ikari Fumihiko with ambiguous looks.

Obviously, he thought that Ikari Fumihiko asked the two to leave in order to make room to do something with the cloned body.

They didn't have any objection to what Fumihiko Ikari wanted to do with the clone. After all, it was just a clone without self-awareness. In their opinion, it was essentially no different from an inflatable doll. But could you not be so impatient? If you really have an idea, can you do it secretly? And...

They are still so young and their development is not complete. How can you have the heart to do this to them?

Even if it's abnormal, there should at least be a limit!

Dr. Ito didn't dare to have any opinion.

Ikari Yui opened her mouth, not knowing what to say for a moment, but she quickly realized that Ikari Fumihiko's expression and posture at the moment did not look like he was hungry.

The moment the misunderstanding was resolved, she understood why Fumihiko Ikari asked the two of them to leave.

"it is good."

After saying that, he turned and walked out.

Dr. Ito didn't understand, but she had no decision-making power in such matters, so she naturally turned around and followed Ikari Yui out.

Halfway through the walk, I heard Fumihiko Ikari ask a question.

“How do I activate this device?”

Dr. Ito paused.

"It's already been debugged. Just... well, I'll help you with the preparations. All you have to do is press the start button."

Ikari Fumihiko responded.

"Ah."

231. Want to know more? No...

After making the preliminary preparations, Dr. Ito did not just turn around and leave, but gave a brief overview of how to determine whether there is a problem with the temporal lobe.

Ikari Fumihiko listened very carefully.

This knowledge was not unfamiliar to him, as he had learned this knowledge when he was in charge of the research and development of neural connection devices.

Only after making sure that Fumihiko Ikari understood did Dr. Ito leave the incubation room.

When I arrived at the office, I saw Ikari Yui watching the surveillance video inside the incubator.

Watching the live broadcast, this is... a bit bad, right? ?

The two cousins ​​were having so much fun that she felt a little overwhelmed, and her original nervousness was alleviated a lot.

Yui Ikari noticed that Dr. Ito's expression was not right, and subconsciously opened her mouth to explain.

"You're thinking wrongly. He doesn't intend to do anything. He just doesn't want us to know the result."

Dr. Ito is not stupid. With Ikari Yui's reminder, he immediately understood what Ikari Fumihiko was worried about.

I don't want these clones to be labeled as defective.

She shook her head secretly.

What's the use of hiding the result? When you make a choice later, the result will be revealed.

He didn't think any further and just silently watched Fumihiko Ikari in the surveillance video.

……

Fumihiko Ikari did not rush to press the start button, but unplugged the device's network cable to prevent the results from being uploaded to the database.

Make this preparation before starting the device.

As the equipment started running, the scan was completed quickly, but it would take a while for the results to come out.

Although the temperature in the incubation room was constant and at the most comfortable temperature for the human body, seeing that the clone was naked, he still took off his white coat and covered the other person with it. Well... besides being worried that the other person would be cold, the delicate body was a bit too distracting. After all, he was a person with normal physiological needs, and he didn't treat the clone as an object.

He felt like he was waiting for judgment as he stayed where he was, and he felt tormented inside.

After hesitating for a moment, he turned and walked quickly out of the incubator.