The Utopia Experiment

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We’re running behind schedule. I can’t be responsible for the weather.”

Christian Dresner nodded and continued to gaze through the Trabant’s dirty windshield. Outside, everything was hung with ice. Decayed houses glistened on either side of the narrow road, tangled power lines sagged with the weight, and the cobblestones glared blindingly in their headlights.

“We should go directly to the rendezvous,” the driver continued nervously. “It’s almost midnight.”

“You took our money,” Dresner said. “Now you’ll do the job according to our agreement.”

The man leaned over the greasy steering wheel, scowling as he tried to coax a little more speed from the car without losing traction.

A quiet rustle came from the backseat, followed by a voice barely audible over the sickly, communist-made engine. “Christian?”

Dresner twisted around and looked at the thin man clutching a briefcase to his chest. At twenty-six, Gerhard Eichmann was two years his senior, but his physique and manner made him seem perpetually trapped between adolescence and adulthood. Despite that impression, though, he was a brilliant psychologist — something highly valued by Soviet politicians obsessed with controlling every aspect of their people’s lives. More important, though, Eichmann was a true friend — a rare treasure in a world full of zealous apparatchiks, secret police, and desperate informants. Perhaps the frail man would be the only friend he would ever have. But it didn’t matter. One like him was enough. More than most people could hope for.

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