Sprouts are small devices placed inside the brain to connect the human mind to the Aether. First created by the Children of Genesis to survive Aetherial corruption, the method to produce sprouts has long been lost to time. Sprouts are therefore considered one of the most important non-renewable resource, and are harvested from dead bodies to be redistributed to newborns.

There are no known Sprout production methods. The search for such a process is considered one of the foremost scientific pursuits, and vast amounts of time and money are invested into the subject by a variety of organizations, government departments, and research institutions.

Various collection initiatives have been proposed and/or tested. Initially, the Crown offered a simple buy-back program. This, unsurprisingly, lead to a vast increase in violent and lethal attacks by criminal groups and desperate individuals. The buy-back program was scrapped and the Crown began purchasing directly through disposal groups such as WasteWorks, funeral homes, and medical centers. This limited, although not entirely eradicated, criminal retrieval of Sprouts; some of the mentioned groups retain ties with criminal groups, and the Overdrive black market remains.

The implanting of 2 or more sprouts is popular within some circles. The practice supposedly allows the user a deeper connection with the Aether, often appearing externally as a drug-like stupor. The more sprouts one has the harder it is to safely remove any, making Overdriving extremely dangerous. Liquidators are known to attempt to remove Overdriver's Sprouts and rehabilitate them into their own ranks, but the success rate is not particularly good.