At dusk near the docks, Ianto and Ripley waited for Vena to reappear from one of the warehouses nearby, to find her hiding place. As they waited, Ianto fancied a chance to smoke and offered Ripley one of his. Declining, Ripley watched as Ianto lit the cigarette and puffed the smoke, sighing.

"What can you tell me about her anyway?" Ripley inquired about Vena.

Ianto described Vena in detail, part of his job description, analytic as always, and when he finished. He summed that, Vena's one of the few good people around, and Lee was lucky to snag her before someone else.

As the cigarette smoldered, Ianto recalled the day Lee came to him for advice about how to woo someone. While Ianto wasn't Cupid, he did give Lee some advice on how to present himself to Vena.

"I told him to just tell the truth and see how it goes," Ianto explained how he helped Lee build courage.

Knowing Lee's former job, Ianto advised him to take it slow, read Vena and make a tactical decision to reveal to her his job as a cross dresser.

"Believe me, it would surprise you how many people show their true selves when you least expect it," Ianto gave a knowing look as he puffed the cigarette. "Especially the ones you'd think wouldn't care much or supposed to support you."

Ianto helped Lee and on the night, he confessed his attraction to Vena, he made sure Lee knew that if anything happened, he and the team would be there to cheer him up.

If violence should've occurred, Ianto might not look it, but the tall lanky fellow with a pencil mustache isn't afraid to show his true colours when provoked.

The whole room erupted in a cheer when Lee gave the good news that Vena accepted him for all his faults and then some and the pair dating.

Cautiously, Ianto kept an eye on the recruit, making sure that Lee wasn't manipulated or other, but he slowly came around to the idea that Lee found true happiness. More, when he finally met Vena in person and read her like a book, seeing how at ease she was with Lee, and the genuine love in her voice.

Eventually, Vena earned her stripes and it saddened the team when they found her as one of the victims. It pained them when Jack ordered them to lie to Lee when her body went missing and the murders started up again.

It's been a trying time for all of them and the moment it's resolved, the team planned to comfort Lee from day and night, until he no longer needed it.

Recruit or not, once someone's part of the team and earned their stripes, they're treated like family until further notice, and Lee's the youngest in their team, thus he'll need all the help.

Jack talked with Ianto about letting Lee talk to a counselor, if need be, and Ianto agreed with Jack.

It's better to have a professional on standby in case Lee needed more help with his grief.

As for what happens afterwards, if all goes well, Lee and the team moved on from Vena's death, painful as it sounded, and continue their lives.

Cruelly it might sound, but Lee's still young and while he loved Vena, he'll find someone else, it's a matter of how he proceeded from that point on.

Jack and Ianto knew the hard truths, this one of them.

Lee couldn't wallow in the pit of despair for long, he'll have to come to terms with his loss and move on. Which meant dating again.

"So, with that said, if anyone gives you a hard time for schlepping the Doctor, send them my way, I'll give them a taste of their own medicine," Ianto offered support for Ripley's relationship with Matt.

Per his job description, Ianto read the pair like books and found they genuinely loved each other. Content with each other at their side.

In this often-cruel world, that kind of love's needed to shine bright through the darkness.

Having dealt with his own issues with people and their refusal to support him and Jack's relationship, Ianto seen it all, and didn't want Ripley and Matt having to deal with it, either.

It's a lot worse when it's family, of all people, but it's better not to dwell on the past, and soldier on.

Hurts for a while, but Thanksgiving's a lot less stressful with that said.

"Thanks," Ripley smiled at Ianto's show of support.

Ianto reminded her that it's a two-way street, but if one in the pair showed any form of distress and it's caused by the other, he'll make sure to correct that behavior.

Jack didn't just love Ianto for his brains, his nature to protect others, too.

"The only pain I put him through is polishing furniture and taking out the rubbish," Ripley joked.

Ianto quipped nobody liked taking out the rubbish, so that's a given.

As he stamped out his dwindled cigarette, Ianto then asked Ripley about the cuffing, and she winced when she heard it.

Ianto looked up at her, giving her a knowing look, and she defended herself, "Hey, I try to find pairs for him that don't have inner ridges."

Ripley already had a box of police cuffs from people selling them, there's enough in there that she didn't have to worry about her sales if she took some.

Not surprising, the ridged cuffs were the only ones with keys and the smoothed ones didn't.

Why buy new cuffs when there's already a box of them?

Ianto shrugged his stout shoulders as he said that he just read them and knew that Ripley wouldn't intentionally hurt Matt, although depending on her mood and the actions at the time, she might wish she could've hurt him, but she wouldn't lay a hand on him.

"Word to the wise, you could always file those ridges down and smooth them," Ianto advised Ripley on how to safely make the pair of cuffs friendlier to Matt without worrying about him bruising his wrists or worse.

Ianto knew it well, his wrists still have some bruising from a bad pair, and with them narrow than others, he needed to find ones that fit him. Which led to the conundrum of having to deal with bruised writs because of how tight the cuffs fit around his wrists.

Hey, Ianto's blunt about his personal life more than anyone on the team, Jack embellishes his, but Ianto tells it how it is.

Pink cuffs weren't worth the money and break too easily. Cheaply made, Ianto might add. Annoying when the pink fuzz clings to bedsheets and pillowcases that never ceases to annoy him when he's doing laundry that night.

The matter of the fact that quality's important and having a pair of cheaply made cuffs snap in half with sharp edges just wasn't on Ianto's itinerary.

"Well, he knows how to get his wrists out without the key, so that's good," Ripley mused.

Ianto nodded and pleased to know that, because those keys were always so damn small and Jack always loses them!

Their conversations continued well into the night as they waited for some sign of Vena and as the cold sea air touched Ripley's nose, she glimpsed around, worried.

None of them knew how Vena changed mentally, but there's a good chance she still remembers Lee.

"What's going to happen when she goes after Lee?" Ripley asked him.

Ianto told her that there's not much they can do.

Jack's got men stationed, ready to shoot Vena on sight, but as for Lee knowing, that's an uphill battle for them to find a way over.

"If she does, we have no choice," Ianto sighed. "She doesn't, we have no choice when we bring back the body."

Either way, Lee's going to want explanation on why nobody told him and Ianto knew he's going to be rightfully angry about Jack keeping him in the dark.

"What's going to happen to her body after this time?" Ripley inquired what'll happen to Vena's body after they kill her for the final time.

Ianto frowned that they'll have to quarantine it for a few days, make sure she doesn't get up again, and depending on what happens, her turning into a vampire might result in the body becoming a focal point in studies.

Which, Jack already placed protocols in place that he has the final say in what happens to Vena's body when they recover it, again, and he's making sure Lee finds peace.

People up top might not like it, but Jack hated seeing Lee upset and nothing would've made him even more upset than knowing the institution's studying Vena's body and understanding how she contracted the pathogens that turned her into a hybrid.

"How did it happen, anyway?" Ripley asked for Ianto's input on how Vena turned into a vampire.

Like Ianto said, Jack embellishes.

Lighting up another cigarette, Ianto told Ripley that the blood transfusion caused by Vena fighting the originator, resulted in an unique mutation none of them saw before.

Other bodies didn't show the signs, they made sure of that, so perhaps the originator feeding on humans up to that point caused cells to mutate and propagate.

"Maybe she wasn't dead when we brought her in," Ianto winced at the idea that Vena was still alive when they brought her to the morgue for examinations. Maybe her heartbeat was near impossible to track and none of them knew it because of the stress at the time.

Ripley comforted him before asking about the chance that Vena survived long enough for the originator's blood to cycle through her body, taking root, and causing the mutation.

The stress from fighting would've caused the heartbeat to soar, given the veins enough time to channel the tainted blood before Vena's body ceased.

"How're we supposed to kill her, don't think garlic's gonna do much and none of us can get close to her with a stake," Ripley asked about ways they'll euthanize Vena.

Frowning as he rested the cigarette on his bottom lip, Ianto said that it's possible they'll just shoot her to death.

"Gwen said we could euthanize her with a syringe full of narc, but as I said, we can't get close to her," Ianto sighed.

Gwen, one of their seasoned agents, said that they can create a serum where the blood coagulates and thickened to the point no matter what, Vena can't consume anymore blood because her body can't process it nor it's own.

Effectively, she'll asphyxiate from the thickened blood and to be sure she's dead, they'll have to destroy her entire body.

"Of course, Jack wouldn't agree with it, I guess it's the guilt," Ianto frowned as he took the cigarette out of his mouth and tapped the built-up ashes onto the soaked dock.

There's noises overhead and the two stopped conversing and looked up. In the air, there's a heavy presence and Ianto ordered Ripley to get behind him as he stomped his cigarette and reached for his radio. He told Jack and the team to be on guard and code jargon that Ripley couldn't understand.

As Ianto radioed, Ripley heard noises close to her and turned her head. There's a torchlight at the end of the dock and her dark eyes narrowed.

Ianto shoved his radio back into his pocket and reached for his issued firearm.

He hated having to do this, but he had to think of Vena as an enemy, not the friend he once knew. Emotionally distancing himself, Ianto prepared his firearm.

"Think it can kill her?" Ripley asked him.

Ianto said it's a standard 9mm, but it should slow her down. Should.

There's clattering noises near them and on guard, the two readied for anything.

Ianto's eyes scanned the rooftops for any movements and Ripley scanned the area around them on the ground.

There's a slight breeze that swept through the two that suddenly stopped.

Ianto hardly had time to register when he's knocked into the warehouse wall, falling to the ground as he slid down the metal side.

Ripley's unable to do much as she's tossed into some crates.

Falling face first into the wet dock, Ripley's dazed and saw muddy shoes in front of her as she dazedly turned her head. Hands violently grabbed her from the ground and she stared into the blackness as Vena's eyes as her mouth opened to reveal the fangs that replaced her original teeth.

Flaying helplessly, Ripley struggled as Vena held her tightly.

Managing to free her right hand, Ripley used it to shock Vena, she must've exerted herself harder than usual because Vena jumped backwards, dropping Ripley to the ground.

Struggling as she felt the wind knocked out of her for using her right hand, Ripley attempted to push herself out of harms way, but Vena wasn't done with her.

Pinned to the ground, Ripley stared up at Vena as she hissed at her.

Guess she didn't like it.

Using her arms, Ripley kept Vena from biting her, but there's only so much Ripley can do, after using her right hand, she couldn't move.

Didn't think that through, but Ripley's desperate to put distance between her and Vena.

Suddenly, Vena grabbed Ripley's arms with her sharpened hands and began squeezing them against her body.

Gurgling Vena leaned forward and Ripley reflected off her black eyes.

Pinned, Ripley couldn't fight back.

"Vena!" Ianto shouts.

Vena turned her head, her black hair stiffly moved as she shrieked in pain as Ianto proceeded to unload six rounds.

In a flash, Vena fled, but not without cutting Ripley's wrist as her clawed hands reflexes from the shooting.

Ianto ran towards Ripley as she gripped her bleeding left wrist, feeling blood pushing through her fingers of her right hand.

"Here, here," Ianto yanked off his trimmed jacket and used it as a gauze on Ripley's wrist as she held pressure.

He radioed in the attack and told medics to stand by.

Ianto helped Ripley up and helped her walk, helping her keep pressure on her wrist until help arrived.