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I was wondering, in what volume of the Astro Boy manga published by Dark Horse does Cobalt first appear? And just out of curiosity, what subsequent stories (and their respective volumes, in order) does he appear in, and what role does he play?

I'm just curious. I want to own all of it, but I like to start collecting things in their proper order first. The first issue apparently comes in a sort of "combo pack" or "package deal" where you get the first two volumes in one for a sort of "buy in bulk" bargain, I guess you could say. But, you can also get them individually. Which is better, the two-in-one combo, or buying individually? The first one is cheaper than buying the two separately, but would I be missing out on anything, besides a second volume cover?

VOLUME 15 CONTAINS the 1st few stories; I have a page that details the proper order of the stories & the volumes in which they appear: Astro Boy Manga Indices; BTW, there are also links to reviews on some of the stories.

He actually first appears in volume 9, in a chapter befittingly called Cobalt. That's his debut chapter actually if you're going by order of original serialization, the other volumes collect chapters where he made appearances. (He did made a quick appearance in Lord Deadcross, which is either in volume 1 or 2.)

Cobalt's manga origin differs from his B&W one. In the manga, Atom has apparently run away when faced with a dangerous mission that his papa supports, but mama is angry at the Ministry of Science for continually placing her baby in danger. So, to avoid this conflict, Atom leaves home. Dr. Ochanomizu creates Cobalt as a stop-gap measure to hopefully take Atom's place on the mission.

In the B&W, Cobalt is a discarded prototype. Thus, Cobalt is Atom's younger/older brother.