Sometimes, it seemed like Mother Nature, Gaia, was out to get us...
         "Snow!" I stopped dead in my tracks inside the physics building's glass front doors, astonished to see a blanket of white outside. Colorado's Front Range rarely got snow anymore. And we never got snow on the Gulf Coast of Missouri, where I grew up.
         "Whoa, Kathy. Lookout. Sorry." Jake Moretti, a new physics grad student, almost ran into me. We awkwardly stepped away from one another. My initial impression was that he was adorable with his swimmer's physique and his earnestness. "Yeah, it was a huge blizzard!" He chuckled, looking out the glass doors. "It's cool. Ha ha. Pun intended." He pushed his wire-rimmed glasses up the bridge of his nose. "Why didn't you notice it when you came into work?"
         I'd wondered why everyone was suddenly wearing jackets. I'd hardly seen any coats this past winter, so I didn't expect to see any now that March was here. "I didn't come into work this morning." I couldn't even remember the last time I'd left the physics building--but I was not a workaholic. Definitely not. It was just that graduate students had a lot to do.
         Jake stopped chuckling. "It was all over the news, too."
         "Ellen, what's in the news?" Ellen was the digital personal assistant app on my fon, currently in my pocket. I'd had her since I was a girl. I'd named her after the awesome astronaut, Ellen Ochoa, from way back in the 1990s.
         "March 4, 2098: Blizzard Blankets Colorado," she said.
         I interrupted her. "New directive: Give me a news report every morning." I reached for the front doors as if under a spell. Snow! I needed to frolic outside immediately.
         Gopal Khan, my Ph.D. advisor, jostled me as he sped past us on the ground floor landing. "Kathy, what are you doing? The physics department meeting is about to start." He checked his worn watch and glared. "It's mandatory. You too, Jake."
         When Gopal got cross with me, which was often for some reason, he reminded me of a bear with his bulky physique and shaggy brown beard and hair. Of course, I'd never actually seen a bear, so I could have been way off.
         "But, look." I pointed out the doors. "It snowed."
         "I know." He gazed outside for a moment, rubbing his beard. "It's remarkable and pretty. But we still have to go to the meeting."
         Ellen said, "The physics department meeting starts in ten seconds."
         Gopal flinched. "Now, we're going to be late." He shot me a dark look. "Tell me Lars is already in the meeting room."
         I shrugged. "I can tell you that, but I'm pretty sure he went out for a toke, so it would be a lie." I pointed out the door. Lars Karlsson, Gopal's purported second-in-command in the neutrino physics group, had a problem with authority. And marijuana. It had to be because of his overbearing physicist father, Hans. If Hans had been my father, I'd have problems, too.
         "Kathy, go outside and see if you can find Lars," Gopal said. "It makes me look bad as the group leader when he doesn't show up for meetings."
         I rubbed my hands together. Snow, here I come! "Gosh, Gopal, if you really want me to, I will."
         "Hurry up," he said.
         I threw open the doors, stepped outside, and squinted. The sunlight reflecting off the snow was blinding; it was like being caught inside a very sparkly diamond. My eyes started watering profusely. A cold diamond; it was definitely cold out here. I shivered. I leaned down, grabbed a handful of (cold!) snow, and made a snowball. I threw it at a red sandstone boulder peeking through the sea of white, and it splattered into a million pieces. It smelled cold and clean out here. Everything seemed fresh and new. I took a deep breath.
         "Gopal says, 'Hurry up,'" Ellen interrupted my adventure.
         I sighed but started down the path through the snow away from the building: stomp, squish, stomp, squish. I couldn't help grinning; this was fun.
         I heard a distant crack of thunder and looked away from my snowy path. I didn't see any clouds. Huh. The snow-covered foothills less than a half kilometer west looked beautiful as they rose majestically into the blue sky.
         Focus, Kath! Now, where had Lars gone?
         Following footsteps in the snow and the sweet tang of pot smoke, I found Lars behind a big red boulder. "You know smoking will kill you," I said as I approached.
         He held the joint carefully with his thumb and forefinger. "I should live so long." He inhaled and held in the smoke.
         "C'mon," I said. "Gopal sent me out here to get you. The department meeting isn't optional."
         Lars brushed his shoulder-length blond hair out of his green eyes and let out his breath. "Tell Gopal I'll be there in a couple of minutes. This Colorado Gold I got at the farmers' market is excellent. Do you want some?"
         "No, I don't want some. And tell Gopal yourself. I'm a physicist, not your errand girl." I stomped my boots in the snow as my feet started to chill.
         "Kathy, you haven't finished your dissertation, so you're not a physicist yet." He flashed his perfect white teeth at me. "But you could be my errand girl if you played your cards right."
         I snorted. "In your dreams, Lars." I had mixed feelings about Lars. Based on a disastrous relationship in my past, I'd vowed never again to date a fellow physicist. But Lars was unusually good-looking for a scientist. Unfortunately, that also meant his ego was unusually large.
         I heard snow squishing under another pair of shoes as Jake appeared around the boulder. When he saw us, he smiled.
         Caught in Jake's smile, I got a sense of the sweet gangly teenager he used to be.
         "What are you guys doing?" Jake said. "Gopal sent me out to get you."
         In the bright sunlight, Jake's intense blue eyes were the color of a pristine alpine lake.
         Uh oh. Focus, Kath! "Uh, nothing. We're not doing anything. We're on our way back to the meeting." I waved my hand around. "Jake, this is Lars; Lars, this is Jake. He's thinking of joining our group." I shivered. My lumpy brown handmade sweater wasn't doing its job, but then how often did it drop below 45 degrees these days?
         Jake noticed. "It's chilly out here. Do you want to borrow my coat, Kathy?" He slipped it off and put it around my shoulders. It was cavernous on my tiny frame.
         Lars smirked and took another toke.
         "Thanks, Jake." I snuggled into it. It smelled faintly of sweat and some kind of cologne. I took a deep breath. "What a gentleman." I shot a glare at Lars, but he didn't notice.
         "I don't understand how the blizzard of the last few days could have been because of global warming." Jake pushed a lock of brown wavy hair away from his eyes.
         "Easy." I felt a smile take over my face. I loved talking science. "Global warming means there's more moisture in the atmosphere and more energy available for weather systems, so storms have increased precipitation, which can be snow." My nose started to run. I resisted the urge to wipe it on the sleeve of Jake's coat.
         Lars stubbed out his now-tiny joint.
         Another loud crack of thunder made us look up.
         "That's weird." Jake searched the sky. "There aren't any clouds. How can there be thunder?"
         The thunder continued to rumble.
         Lars stood up and looked to the west, over the boulder. "I think it's from over there."
         The rumbling got louder. "What's that?" I pointed west. A massive cloud of white moved down the mountain slope towards us. It was huge, awe-inspiring. Terrifying. "Look!"
         "Huh." Lars giggled. "Pretty."
         "What?" Jake asked. "Where?"
         "There!" I said. "There! West! I'm telling you, there's a huge white mass of something headed right for us!" My extended finger trembled.
         "Is it possible?" Jake asked. "Gaia! I've never seen a what-do-you-call-it, an avalanche, before. Shouldn't we get back to the building?" He turned.
         An avalanche! It had been snowing for days and days in the mountains to the west of us, and now all that snow was heading our way.
         I felt a sudden strong gust of cold air. And it was coming straight for us! "There's no time! Take cover!" I grabbed Jake and Lars and pulled them down behind the boulder just as the first icy tendrils of snow kissed my bare neck.
         I scrunched up against the boulder and held Jake's coat above my head as the snow started to cascade over it. I couldn't catch a breath and felt as if I was suffocating. The snow fell in bigger and bigger chunks, and the patter of snow landing on the jacket turned into pounding. I tried to angle my impromptu tent so the snow would slide off me and away from the others. Wispy streams of snowflakes drifted down in the slight gap between the jacket and the rock. My ankles and shins were freezing. My legs were already half-buried. I stamped my feet and tried to get on top of the snow.
         After what seemed like an eternity, the pounding changed back to pattering. I opened my eyes and peeked out from under the jacket. We lucked out. "I think it's over." Jake and Lars crouched next to me in only a meter of new snow.
         They blinked and brushed snow off themselves.
         "Cool." Lars stood up.
         "We're okay! I can't believe it." Jake wiped snow off his clothes.
         "Those rock formations above us must have diverted most of it away from us." I brushed snow off Jake's coat and handed it back to him. "Thanks a lot, Jake."
         "So, where'd the snow go?" Jake glanced around.
         Lars pointed back toward the physics building. "Look."
         Our gaze followed his finger. Snow buried one side of the physics building up to the second-floor windows, and it looked like some of them were broken. That couldn't be good.
         "Oh no!" The meeting was on the first floor there. I fumbled for my fon. "Ellen, call emergency services. There's been an accident, an avalanche, on campus at the physics building."
         "Message acknowledged," Ellen said. "Calling emergency crews now."
         "C'mon, you guys, we have to go help!" I said.
         I tried to run to the physics building, but it seemed to take forever as my feet sunk in the snow. It was like some horrible dream where I could only move in slow motion.
         After about a million years, Jake and I got to the front door and had to kick the snow away from it to get it to open. Lars was lagging far behind.
         Jake and I ran towards the conference room past broken windows and through snow drifts in the hall.
         Inside the conference room, the snow had crashed through all the windows. People were already digging frantically.
         Lily, the physics department's administrative assistant, saw us come into the room. She usually seemed like someone's granny with her quick smile, short gray hair, and conservative clothes, but today she barked orders like a drill sergeant. "You guys, come here, dig next to me. A bunch of people were sitting right here."
         I went to where she indicated. I dogpaddled through the snow, shoving it behind me. My fingers felt so cold they burned, but soon they went numb.
         Soon, some wiggling fingers appeared right in front of me.
         I uncovered the rest of the hand and the arm, followed it to the torso, and exposed the face. I recognized Marcello, my old officemate. His thinning dark hair was plastered to his head, and his skin was red and blotchy. He gasped and opened his eyes. I unearthed more of him and found he still sat in a chair. "Hold on, Marcello! I'll get you out." I moved more snow, grabbed a chair arm, and rolled it out.
          He gasped and brushed snow off himself. "Grazie, Kathy!"
         "Prego, Marcello," I said.
         I saw another chair arm sticking out of the snow. Quickly I turned my attention from Marcello and scooped snow away from where another head might be. Success. It was a woman, Gabrielle, one of the members of the fusion group. I finished exposing her face, but she didn't seem to be breathing.
         I yanked the chair out of the drift.
         Lily caught my eye. "Is she all right?"
         "I'm not sure," I said. "I don't think so."
         Lily moved towards us. "Here, let me check for a pulse. I know CPR; I'll take her. Keep digging."
         I found another chair arm and tugged on it, but it wouldn't budge. I kept pulling on it. It had to move! I pulled some more. Did it move a little? I was starting to get frantic.
         Jake reached over me and started brushing snow away from head level. "Uncover the face first." His voice was high-pitched with stress.
         I started brushing snow away from the face area. "Right, I knew that." We uncovered a male head.
         I felt his neck for a pulse. Nothing. "I can't find a pulse! He's not breathing!" I was barely breathing myself. I realized we had managed to clear all the way around the conference table. Most of the snow had been spread around the room. We had uncovered everyone. Several people were doing mouth-to-mouth resuscitation or CPR on fallen colleagues.
         Gopal stood on the other side of the chair next to me. His neat beard had snow caked on it, and his brown eyes were solemn and unblinking as he examined the man next to me. "Kathy, get out of the way." He lowered the man onto the floor and started mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.
         Lily came over. "I'll start CPR."
         I scanned the room. "Is everyone accounted for?" There weren't any large piles of snow left. We must have uncovered everyone.
         "Lars? Where's Lars?" Gopal asked.
         "Still outside," I said. "Or maybe in the hall."
         Now that the immediate danger was over, I was panicking. I leaned my head down, resting my numb hands on my knees. Between labored breaths, I said, "Lars is fine."
         A piece of window glass fell, shattering on the floor. We all startled at the loud noise.
         "Careful, everyone!" I yelled. "Move into the hall if you can."
         I took the arm of a very pale Marcello and led him out of the room.
         I felt exhausted and couldn't tell if I still had fingers, they were so numb. I put my hands under my armpits to try to thaw them. As I stood in the hall with my shaken colleagues, I heard ambulance sirens approaching.
         We trudged down the hall, and someone pulled out a chair for me. "Kathy, sit."
         How could I've been so idiotic with that last guy? I knew, I knew, I should have uncovered his face first. Did my mistake kill him? Gaia, I didn't even notice who it was. I leaned forward in the chair as my hands started to burn.
         Off in the distance, far away, I heard talking. I rocked back and forth. Who did I kill?
         "Miss!" Someone put his hand on my back. "Miss, are you all right? What's your name?"
         I gazed at the medic leaning over me. His cheeks were flushed. "Do you know your name? Do you know where you are?"
         I nodded. Kathy.
         Jake came up. "That's Kathy. I think she called emergency services. She seemed all right a little while ago." He leaned down and peered into my face. "Kathy?"
         "Jake. What? What do you want?" I focused on his face.
         "Are you all right?" He gazed into my eyes, and his forehead was wrinkled in concern.
         I nodded. "I think so. Who didn't I get to in time?"
         "You did the best you could," Jake said.
         "Who was it?" I asked.
         "It was Professor Guy Cassou, one of the French guys in the fusion group. He didn't make it." Jake shook his head.
         The medic straightened up. "I doubt you could have done anything more, but if you called emergency services, you saved lives. You're a hero."
         "You hear that, Kathy? You're a hero." Jake rubbed my back.
         I didn't feel like a hero.
         "Anyway, Miss, if you're okay, please move into the other room. We're still assessing the situation." He pointed further down the hall, and we stumbled off in that direction.
         Gopal stood in the hallway and checked us off on a list as we went into one of the classrooms. His clothes were soaked. "Thank Gaia, you are all right. Not everyone was so lucky."
         I realized I was pretty wet myself. "Who?" My lips trembled so much it was hard to talk. "Who didn't make it?"
         Gopal consulted the list as if such horrible news couldn't be held in the brain. "Uh, let's see, we lost Professor Cassou and his student, Gabrielle." Gopal paused and sniffed, wiping his nose with his palm.
         Gaia! That was awful. I nodded, not trusting myself to speak.
         Gopal stared stony-eyed at his checklist for a few moments. "It's too horrible to believe ...but we lost everyone in the fusion group. They're all gone."
         Jake gasped.
          "Jean-Phillipe? Everyone?" I asked. Jean-Phillipe was Gabrielle's significant other; they'd come here to Colorado together.
         Gopal just nodded.
         I collapsed against the doorjamb.
         An EMT came up, and Gopal's face turned white as he conferred with him quietly.
         Jake and I just looked at each other in disbelief.
         I couldn't process this.
         The emergency worker shook his head as he walked away.
         Gopal's slack face seemed to grow more haggard, and his eyes more haunted as he looked at us. "That was, that was about the department chair, Joe Davidson. He didn't make it either. He had a heart attack."
         "No." My eyes finally overflowed. This was just all too much and all wrong. I stumbled to the floor.
         "Miss? Miss?" The EMT ran back to me. "Are you..."
         Everything went black.