Spoiler: Verde
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The Verde/Vegeta comparison is doing weird things to my brain. Not that I mind it, it's just... my imagination goes to strange places sometimes. So Vegeta trains hard to go Super-Saiyan, right? Verde trains hard too, only she's not a Saiyan, she's a wizard. So she's training to go Super...Wizard... Oh no...

Spoiler: oh dear...
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FINAL CHAPTER! LET'S GO!

Spoiler: Chapter Twenty-Four
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Rei wakes up from a comforting, dreamless sleep. A detail that adds a certain small tragedy to the character, is that apparently Rei has always dreamed of nothing but fire. It's all embers and roaring infernos with Rei's dreams. I guess she's never had a happy dream. Not one that she remembers anyway.

Of course, Rei wakes up in a hospital bed. Seeing as how she got the snot beat out of her and passed out in the street, it makes sense that she'd be put there. Chloe is there when she wakes up, and is a little too relieved that Rei's alright as she enthusiastically hugs her. Ow. Rei still has no feeling in her right hand, and it's been splinted.

As for everyone else, Verde and Gamma both have some frostbite in addition to their other injuries. They'll both be fine though. Apparently, Verde's mother saw to both of them. And was also so angry at being kept out of the loop, that Gamma was scared. Now, Gamma's a menacing guy. What scares Gamma though? Dr. Mom.

Rei is out of danger, she's healing and she with a friend. Yet she reflects that she is not OK. She still killed someone, and she has to live with that fact. She pushes that thought down for now as Chloe takes her hand. The upside to all this is that Rei and Chloe seem to have repaired their relationship, or at least rebuilt it into something their both happy with. Rei asks about what Chloe was going to say when Kestrel had her on the phone. It's pretty clear that it was going to be "I love you," but I can see why Rei might want to hear it when neither of them are in mortal peril. Chloe gets flustered and says that she'll tell her if Rei can beat her in a rematch. Rei's wager is a callback to Chloe's from the game tournament-- if Chloe can beat her, Rei will hang out with her, and just her, for a week.

On the rooftop of the hospital, Verde and Gamma are training. This is despite their injuries. Guys... take a break. Meanwhile Ella is eating a big tray of hospital food as she looks on. Eventually Verde and Gamma decide to rest for a moment. Verde takes this moment to show off her knife, the one that she enchanted with her own blood. It produces a gust of wind when it's drawn from the sheath. Verde takes a moment to catch a glimpse of her reflection with her new battle scar. Verde's upside is that she's got a cooler-looking face. Gamma and Ella both have a look at the knife, the latter with some reluctance. Neither of them know what to make of it. Verde just has a windy cutthroat razor now. Good thing too, as the three agree that ONY will be back for them.

Speaking of ONY, Kite's been observing things from a distance it seems. (Remember him? Kestrel's buddy?) Maybe "buddy" is too generous of a term, since Kite approaches the scene of Kestrel's fight with Rei and reflects on his failings. Unlike Kestrel, Kite is able to play a long game and he gets what he's after-- a sample of Rei's blood, likely very clean from a combination of Rei's pyromancy and the cold air. What's it for? We'll have to wait and see, I suppose.

Back at home, Aria slumps into her chair and searches for someone in a book of contacts. She's interrupted by President Yamata of ONY coming onto the news. He's presenting a new in-home robot that can take care of everything from security concerns to childcare. Now, as cool as a robot nanny sounds, Aria recognizes the "robot" for what it really is-- a puppet. No one could every understand how dangerous letting something like that into your home would be.

Aria finds the contact. Evidently not someone she knew very well, but someone that Samson did. She calls and after a while gets an answer from a woman named Luna Crescent. Aria says that she wants to hire Luna now that Orochi Yamata has found them.

That's where the chapter and the book ends. For now, there's at least Rei and Chloe resolving their differences and Verde growing into a role that she feels suits her. Also, our heroes made it out alive so that's good. We're already getting things planted for the next book, Hidden Embers. Who is Kite exactly? His description is deliberately sparse, but we have some clue to his personality already. He'll hang out and observe things from a distance. He prides himself on being able to play a "long game," which seems consistent with Kestrel's semi-truthful anecdote.

Luna Crescent is also largely unknown, but some things can be inferred about her-- she's gruff, possibly a drinker since Aria is not sure if the grogginess in her voice is from sleep, she also knew Samson but didn't remember him right away. Her forgetting about Samson could be taken a number of ways. Maybe she wasn't as close to Samson as Aria thought, maybe she's so used to seeing people killed that she doesn't remember them as well, maybe it's because it happened eighteen years ago. Though she immediately becomes collected and professional as soon as it's mentioned that she has a job.


I separated out some closing thoughts for the book as a whole as well.

Spoiler: Closing thoughts
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On its own, Initial Sparks is a decent outing. Like has been noted here, there's foreshadowing that's subtle enough that it's not immediately obvious on the first readthrough, which makes it good to reread as well. Not only that, it prevents twists from seeming like they came out of nowhere.

As the first entry to a series, Initial Sparks needs to introduce readers to the world and get them interested, and this is a point where I feel it succeeds. Not just because of its worldbuilding, but because of what it says about the direction of the characters involved. As Rater has noted, Verde seems more OK with the darker side of the supernatural world than Rei and Ella are. Not to say that Verde is definitely going to go in a darker direction, but she and Gamma seem the most cool about everything that happened.

Now, when I finish reading a book I'll usually do one of two things. Either I'll put it away and not think about it for a while or I'll seek out other write-ups about it, read its TVtropes page and try to experience as much of the work as possible. Initial Sparks is firmly in the latter category. As I get my final thoughts down, I can't help but feel a little ambivalent. I'm glad to have read it, but I don't want to be finished. Hidden Embers will be out eventually, and I think it practically goes without saying that I'll be reading that one as well.