Ingrid Denner

Ingrid Denner is an investigator inside Harkness Pharmaceuticals whose inquiry into the Elixtris project uncovers research spending that does not fit the company’s stated pharmaceutical work. Her insistence on tracing the money and identifying who authorized it makes her a determined challenger to the secrecy surrounding Filippo Crosetti’s research operation and Jack Harkness’s authority.

Role and investigative remit

Ingrid has a scheduled meeting with Crosetti at Harkness Pharmaceuticals’ headquarters in Zug on 14 June. The stated subject is a separate issue, the contraindications position statement, but she intends to use the meeting to question him about specialist contractor 55. Human Resources will not disclose personal information about this forty-six-year-old British woman, who is attached to Crosetti’s staff; the company says Crosetti insists on absolute confidentiality for specialists he recruits personally. He supervises their work from the research facility in Locarno and is solely responsible for them. The arrangement gives Ingrid a specific point of inquiry: the distance between a company employee’s responsibility for oversight and a research group kept behind a wall of personal confidentiality.

The email and the research trail

Ingrid’s 12 June email to Crosetti outlines a larger concern. The outside scientists listed in an attachment were first introduced to the company by Ms Townsend, and their expertise in nanotechnology and bioelectronics does not appear directly relevant to producing a conventional cosmetic. Ingrid identifies a significant budget allocation for their engagement and asks that the matter be discussed at the Zug headquarters. She directs that further communications with her go through her BlackBerry until further notice, without explaining why.

When Blake later reads the email on Crosetti’s phone, the attachment contains more than twenty names: professors and other specialists at universities in Europe, the United States, Canada, Australia, and Japan. Blake suspects that Ingrid has discovered the Sapper device, but this remains Blake’s inference rather than a confirmed explanation from Ingrid. The message nevertheless shows that Ingrid is pursuing a documented trail of contacts and expenditures, rather than relying on a general suspicion about Crosetti’s work.

Confrontation at headquarters

When Ingrid arrives at the company premises, she is presented as composed and formidable, dressed in a sharply tailored suit, with her hair carefully arranged and a piercing gaze. She challenges the presence of Jane Glasson, whom she accuses of having participated in placing an illegal spying device on her laptop in London. Ingrid calls Jane a serious threat to Harkness Pharmaceuticals’ security and objects to her being allowed onto the premises, much less into Jack Harkness’s private office.

Ingrid states that she is authorized to do whatever is necessary to establish the truth about Crosetti’s and Jane’s duties for the company. She wants to question them in a later meeting, but Jane presses to begin immediately, with everyone present. Crosetti resists the suggestion, leaving Ingrid’s authority and the competing demands for disclosure in plain view: Jane wants an open confrontation, while Ingrid insists on an inquiry conducted under her remit.

Following the money

In the ensuing questioning, Ingrid presses Crosetti on the substantial sums assigned to nanotechnology and bioelectronics. She has spoken with the highly regarded specialists themselves and recognizes that their work is expensive. Her concern is not merely that the research looks unusual; she argues that Harkness Pharmaceuticals has funded projects with no obvious bearing on developing new pharmaceutical products or improving existing ones. Crosetti answers that the work is not irrelevant, but Ingrid demands a chemical application for the work he has supported so generously.

She also says she has reason to believe Crosetti has acted as a conduit for a vast package of additional funding with no booked source, which she can only assume Jack Harkness arranged. Crosetti replies that he is not an accountant; Ingrid counters that he is a chemist and therefore should be able to explain the scientific purpose of the funded work. The exchange leaves the underlying programme unresolved, but establishes the force of Ingrid’s inquiry: she connects confidential recruitment, unusual specialist expertise, unexplained budgets, and Crosetti’s personal responsibility, refusing to let the technical complexity of the work serve as an answer in itself.