I would like to thank everyone who has read and reviewed this story, it really does motivate me to write more.

(Herculaneum, Year: 77 A.D.)

Maddy was held tightly in her new husband's arms, the soft furs covering them as they watched the sun begin to set through the window.

"Marc, let me up please." She had tried to get up several times, but he refused to let her go each time.

"Please stay," he always talked slow to her so she would understand each word, but she had to ask others to slow down often.

"I just need to get something from the market." She tried again, but this time he called for someone, dragging her back to him.

A servant came in and Maddy, with a pink face as she covered herself, requested a dog and Marc gave the man coin to buy the animal.

As soon as the man left, she relaxed back. "Why did you want to marry me so quick all of a sudden?"

She felt all his muscles bunch and looked up at him. "I don't want Nero seeing you, but, if somehow he does see you during his stay in the city, you being my wife might keep his wandering hands off you." He talked with much more vindictiveness that had Maddy wandering what was happening. "He should not even be here now. After what he did!" Her husband was spitting now, and Maddy instinctively pressed deeper into the crook of his arm. "I would have killed him if he weren't a Senator."

"What did he do?" But Marc shook his head, a scowl etched on his face. Maddy wandered why he would anger her husband and then return, why would he even let him into his home. And she asked him just that.

"It is considered improper, and he is a powerful senator, I don't want on the wrong side of him." His deep voice and slow words where starting to put Maddy to sleep. A lot has happened so far….And in one day too!

But was this the right thing to do? She was not the type of person to just do something without thinking, no that was more like Josh. However, she did agree to marriage, for a date that would be more like several months from now, instead of a hasty ceremony on the same day as betrothal. Usually she thought for a while before speaking and she could feel the inkling of a panic attack.

Voices reached Maddy and soon a woman slave stood in the room, talking too fast for Maddy to translate and wringing her hands. Mark waved and she left the Master and Wife of the house to get dressed.

Mark in his finest attire, but Maddy went with something plane, seeing as Mark didn't intend on her meeting the guest.

It was green, almost identical to the dress she had some through the portal in. But the fabric went to the floor and thin straps were woven through the fabric at the shoulders, this way it only showed the tops of her shoulders.

"Wife, stay with me, or in our rooms for when he is here, he has a summer villa not far from here, and I don't trust him."

She merely nodded and sat on her bed, Zoe joining her soon after, Marc having sent her to her older sister.

(Terra Nova, Year: 85 million years in the past)

Elizabeth was having panic attacks every few hours now, her little babies were in ancient Rome and one was being married off. How could this happen, she saw them only two days prior!

"Liz, listen, I think I may have something here." Malcolm waved at her. She ran over to him, having stood in his lab all day with her husband, son, and the Commander. "I think I can hold down the chamber of the time fracture and widen it, essentially sending us through."

Jim took a breath, he could finally breath. In a few months he would see his baby girls again and bring them home. "How long to build the terminus?"

"Four months at best."Maclom said, "I would say three, but I refuse to send anyone through without testing it, or hell you would end up on the other side, well inside out." Malcolm shivered. "It's best to test."

"Is there anything else?" Jim asked the doctor, looking for help from the unlikely source.

"Well, I do know that Roman courting engagement and wedding ceremonies take months, right days have to be picked and everything….not to mention that the wife must be pure for the night of the wedding, so we have almost a year give or take a month or so, we'll have this done in-"

Josh growled. "Hurry the hell up, those are my little sisters out there."

(Herculaneum, Year: 77 A.D.)

Marc stood glaring at Nero, that bastard, that unfazed scum of Pluto's own hell. The man was shorter than the towering Marcellus, but he had grown a gut since the ex soldier last saw him.

He wore a simple white toga with blue edges and his hair was cut short, "Hello old friend." Of all the gods in the heavens, land, sea, and below his feet, Nero was drunk already.

"Good evening Senator Nero Gaius Maximus. What brings you here?" a soft hand slipped into the Master's rough hand and he looked down to see his little daughter. He had made sure that they didn't say a thing about their new mother to anyone outside their family and house hold servants.

"Daddy, I'm tired and Sam says he's hungry." She always took care of Sam, since there was not mother for a long time she made it her duty to be a caring big sister.

Marc smiled and patted her hand. "Nero, have you eaten-"

"Yesh, jus came by to say 'hello', good nigh." With that the man hit the floor, leaving Marc in stunned silence. Who the hell had this man become? First tyrant that Marc hates with a passion, and now a drunk that has passed out on his floor after greeting him as if Nero hadn't wronged his family so.

Senator Nero's slaves collected him and bowed, leaving them immediately. What just happened?

Marc still hated him, still hated being around the senator, and frankly was happier that he spent almost less than three minutes on his property.

"Leah, get your mother and sister, let's have our evening meal." The little girl goes off to get the woman and girl. Marc was still unsettled with Nero's sudden appearance and drunken demeanor when he arrived.

Soft hands touched his arm and he looked back to see his little wife. "Is everything fine?" She asked, leaning forward and rocking up onto her toes to peck his lips. He kissed her again, longer, before taking her hands.

"He left. So you will be dinning with us." He waved to the table and she and Zoe sat down on one of the floor pillows. "Maddy, are you alright?" He noted how she shifted uncomfortably and would sometimes whimper.

"Perfect, um, sore." She shook her head and cut a piece of bread for each of the children. "Bread?"

(Terra Nova, Year: 85 million years in the past)

Jim was pacing his living room, looking at his daughters' room every once in a while. He wasn't so scared anymore about their safety….but Maddy was getting married, and he never wanted that type of decision to be left on her shoulders for the well being of her younger sister.

But he was so proud of her for putting Zoe first in the old world.

"Dad?" Josh was standing in his doorway, "Do you think they're hurting Maddy? I mean I know she'll take care of Zoe, but she just has this mentality to let herself get hurt if it means making Zoe happy."

"Yeah, but she said she would marry a good man." To be honest he doubted that Maddy even knew much about her future husband. "But we'll get them back before she is married." He promised and hugged his son. "We are going to get them both back."

(Herculaneum, Year: 77 A.D.)

Maddy saw the head of one of the slaves poke around the corner and wave at her. She stood and approached him. "We have the dog."

She nodded, "Good, now I will give you a signal and you will bring him out to the fountain." The slave nodded and Maddy returned to dinner, saying that she would like to take a walk afterwards.

Marc stared at her, hoping she would tell him what she was up to, but instead she just grinned and offered him some cheese.

(Terra Nova, Year: 85 million years in the past)

"Liz." Jim sighed, sitting on the bed where his wife was crying.

"Oh, Jim, I just think of this letter, and I realized I failed my daughter as a mother. I was supposed to protect her and get her ready for life, not….this." She waved the letter around, the last thing she got from her second child.

"I know, Liz, but Malcolm-"

"I know, but four months Jim, who know what could happen in four months."

"Maddy's a genius, she will take care of Zoe and herself, things will work out." He promised as she cried into his chest. "And the engagement will take time, we'll get them back."

"I hate feeling so powerless!" She exclaimed before he agreed with her, rubbing her back as she stroked his shoulders. Trying to comfort her husband as much as he was comforting his wife.

(Herculaneum, Year: 77 A.D.)

Maddy walked with the children and her husband out to the fountain, a letter in hand. During her stay in the room, Zoe and her wrote a letter to their parents. Whether they got the last letter or this one, at least it was hope that both girls held onto.

She watched the children each throw a coin in the water, wishing for something. But when Sam huffed and turned away, Maddy waved at the servants, them sneaking along the shadows to the odd family.

She looked at the air, finding that sparkle and pressing the paper at it, until a flash of blue light filled the darkness and Sam was whopping with happiness.

Maddy turned back to see a huge black dog race towards him, and for a moment everyone froze, all thinking it would kill him.

But then she, from what Maddy could see, began licking him with a long pink tongue.

"You know when I asked for a dog, I was thinking puppy and not bear." Her voice cracked after being so frightened from the almost attack on the five year old.

The servant just shrugged. "She was good priced." Maddy shook her head, at least Sam was happy as he hugged the giant around the neck.

"The gods are truly blessing out family!" He announced as he buried his face in the long fur of the creature. Everyone who heard laughed before retiring for the night.

(Terra Nova, Year: 85 million years in the past)

What was left of the Shannon family raced towards the Command Center, they had gotten word of another letter.

Elizabeth ripped open the seal and unrolled the message.

"Dear Mom, Dad, and Josh,

"Hope everything is going well, a lot has happened here. The same day Marcellus asked for my hand in marriage, a senator announced he was coming to visit. As the result, Marcellus had us married by mid afternoon the same day. A lot isn't it.

"He has been ever so gentle with me and respected me. I think I am very lucky. But Marcellus has yet to tell me why the Senator set him off.

"Zoe is doing well, and I am going to teach her Latin in the morning, at least she can learn this since women are expected to be, well a wife.

"However, I will teach her as much as I can. And write you almost every day.

"And Leah and Sam, Marcellus' adopted children love her, they are always playing together and are around her age. Looks like I'm mom and wife already.

"With all the love in the world,

"Maddy and Zoe."

Jim felt like he was going to be sick and barely caught his wife as she fainted. And Elizabeth was not a fainter, having seen nearly everything there is as a doctor.

(Herculaneum, Year: 77 A.D.)

Maddy fellback into bed and propped herself up on her elbows. "Wait, wait." She placed one hand on his now bare chest, heaving and heart racing after she let him kiss her down the hall. "I need to know why you have been acting odd since news of the Senator's coming reached us."

That and she didn't think her body had recovered enough from her first time to go again. Now she understood when Skye Tate said men her insatiable.

Taking several breaths, he collapsed on the bed beside her. "You know we have been married for a day and you are already trying to avoid our nights together."

Moving herself, she leaned back against the head bored at stared at him, hair disheveled and one of her dress sleeves off her shoulder. "Please, I need to understand."

Backing up, he sat on the edge, at the foot of the bed and furthest from his new wife.

"Leah and Sam's mother was very much like my own sister, her name was Alexandria. She took me under wing after I left the military. I started working really hard and became a good merchant, we bought a good house, small. She was eighteen, and orphan, I was seventeen.

"So that makes you twenty five now?" She was surprised with how young he looked. He smiled at her and gave a little nod, his lovely blues eyes glowing the in the moon light like that or a wolf under the same lighting.

"And finding my own way, through I started to train with gladiators to protect my family better, after….They stormed into our little home, I thought Nero was my friend, but instead I watched him rape her."

He stood up and came to his side of the bed to pet her arms and stroke the soft flesh around her neck. "Maddy, he is Leah and Sam's father, I found out when Alexandria was dying after giving birth to Sam. And Nero must never know."

"Is this why you hid me from her?" Maddy had to clear her throat, those innocent little children were born from pain and the lows of humanity.

"Yes, I didn't want the same thing to happen," he leaned forward and kissed her slow, cupping the back of her head to deepen the kiss. She pulled him closer and snuggled against him.

"How did he get to her a second time?" She wondered.

"That is still a mystery to me." He huffed. "Let's go to bed, this is a bad memory for me." She nodded and laid her head on his chest.

What a crazy day.

Please Review, I really like to hear how this is going.