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"Outbreak": Featuring from Earth-51's Buddy Blank point of view, he recalls that after the New Earth heroes were brought to the inner sanctum of Cadmus, the facility's higher staffs were initially incredulous of the Atom's story, but Dubbilex vouch for him and his friends and that the presence o

Quote1 Not only were WE going down, we were taking everyone WITH us. The END...of...EVERYTHING...was NIGH. Quote2
Buddy Blank (Earth-51)

Countdown to Final Crisis #6 is an issue of the series Countdown (Volume 1) with a cover date of March, 2008.

Synopsis for "Outbreak"

Featuring from Earth-51's Buddy Blank point of view, he recalls that after the New Earth heroes were brought to the inner sanctum of Cadmus, the facility's higher staffs were initially incredulous of the Atom's story, but Dubbilex vouch for him and his friends and that the presence of a deceased Karate Kid, who is still infected with the Morticoccus Virus, concerns them. It is not until that the Martian Manhunter came to the facility and read Dubbilex's and the others' minds that they were telling the truth. Eventually Cadmus have Karate Kid's corpse in confinement, and proceed to extract an antidote from Atom's immunity to the virus; however, Cadmus' scientists are having extreme difficulty in analyzing the virus that has capabilities beyond that of a normal virus. With Una's reluctant consent, Cadmus have to surgically remove the virus from Karate Kid. Buddy Blank later comfort an extremely upset Una in the waiting room. It is from there that he sees an odd news report of a strange hostage crisis. The situation reveals that a simple suburban father has acted like an animal and attack the police. When the police's canine unit brought the man down, the dog suddenly turns on its handlers and was forced to be shot. Buddy summarize that later on the same police dog was brought to a different Cadmus lab and that the animal had human hands.

About an hour later, the lab staff has undergone in extracting the virus from Karate Kid's spine. Meanwhile, Dubbilex has himself examine Jimmy Olsen's powers, but only to have "weird superpower response." Moments later the lab's contamination alarm blares. Curious of what is happening, Buddy is informed by a response team that the Morticoccus Virus had "leaped" out of Karate Kid's spinal column and grown to monstrous proportions. Kyle Rayner, Donna Troy, Mary Marvel, Firestorm, and the Atom tried their best in containing the virus, but it fought its way to the lab's rooms and it's non-sterilized corridors, where the staff and civilians are safely located. Kyle Rayner uses his ring to contain the virus. Unfortunately and unexpectedly, the virus explodes into "dust" forcing to broke through the ring's containment. Atom quickly orders Kyle to lock down every virus particle. As Kyle contain the particles and rush the remains to a sterile lab, Buddy and the other scientists are worried about being infected given that the virus had exploded in the same air that they breathe. Atom and Dubbilex began studying the virus particles. Buddy was explained by one of the lab techs who thought that the virus maybe had "changed shape" in an effort to escape: a level of sophistication that is unheard of in the history of virology. Atom and Dubbilex scanned a pre-extraction sample of the virus against a post-extraction sample. It is then overall revealed that the Morticoccus Virus is broken loose to the world.

The first Morticoccus Virus mass outbreak begins in Gotham City. It is from here that Kyle Rayner, given orders by the Atom, forcefully brings back Jason Todd back to Cadmus Lab, in which Jason's reaction to the others was "mutual."

By this time, the lab staff has synthesized a limited number of inoculations from the Atom's blood. It is then decided that the inoculations were given to the heroes who could "put out" the "big fires" the Morticoccus started, and do it quickly. The Atom later went to the JLA and brief them on the full nature of the threat.

Buddy himself start to study the way the virus spread from people to people and later realize that, given from what he had seen on the news about the police dog, the virus doesn't focus on humans but also on all kinds of lifeforms. Karate Kid's body was later put in stasis, in which Una spent hours staring at him. When she began to felt like talking, Una explains to Buddy of her life with Karate Kid. Meanwhile, the "anomalies" are growing restless with each other, primarily with Jason Todd. On the news, politicians and government officials began covering up the origins of the Morticoccus Virus. Soon later, the lab has its own infected: when a scientist, Lucy Grinker, from test animal department have become feral and attacked her Cornell intern. Within twenty minutes Grinker was subdued and later experimented. Atom then discovered from her that her DNA is encoded with traces of genes from the test animals that she interacted with. Showing that the virus turns humans into becoming more animalistic, while animals are taking on human qualities. At this point, Atom is felt completely defeated and with no idea in stopping the virus. He is then informed by Una of the virus' origins and the reason why it is elusive. This led to a larger meeting with the Center for Disease Control and the JLA. At this time the Morticoccus Virus has spread around the world.

Buddy is then met with Una who told him partially off what she told in the meeting. The reason that no one couldn't contain the virus was that it originated thousand of years into the future, a future where both medicine and illness were very advance than the present, thus leaving the present little chance in surviving the outbreak and leaving few people to be immune in thanks to Atom's inoculation. Ultimately, words of this finding brought many well-trained scientists to abandon their work and be with their families in the coming end. The "anomalies" began fighting each other, with Mary Marvel brutally striking down Jason Todd. Even Earth-51's Hal Jordan wanted to take measures on his own in which Atom argues him out of it. Seeing no one couldn't do anything about it, Buddy decides to leave for his family's safety who is in Metropolis. He is then stopped by Una. Buddy explain to her of his intentions and takes his chances outside that is running rampant. However, Una decides to come with him in a chance to "do something good." Reluctant in letting Una joining with him and faces the peril of being turned in for desertion, Buddy allows her to come with him. Upon leaving Cadmus, Buddy recalls of seeing a bolt of green shooting into space, in which turns out to be Hal Jordan who intends on seeking interstellar help, but not knowing that he is carrying the virus with him, inadvertently spreading the infection over the universe.

Appearing in "Outbreak"

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

Antagonists:


Other Characters:

  • Karate Kid (Appears only as a corpse)
  • Dubbilex (Earth-51)
  • Mickey Cannon (Earth-51)
  • Serling Roquette (Earth-51)
  • Batman (Earth-51)
  • Martian Manhunter (Earth-51)
  • Superman (Earth-51)
  • The Flash (Earth-51)
  • Hal Jordan (Green Lantern) (Earth-51)

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Vehicles:




Synopsis for "The Origin of Felix Faust"


Appearing in "The Origin of Felix Faust"

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Other Characters:

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Notes



See Also


Links and References



DC Universe
Countdown Crossover
The events from this issue or series are related to the Countdown to Final Crisis. Countdown was a weekly series spanning exactly 52 issues, and tying in with plots across many story arcs all over the DCU. This template will automatically categorize articles that include it into the Countdown Crossover category.
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