In 1916, Emma O'Neill is frozen in time. After sampling an experimental polio vaccine brewed on a remote island off St. Augustine, Florida, she and her family stop aging - as do the Ryans, her family's business partners. But soon a group of religious fanatics, the Church of Light, takes note, and Emma and Charlie are the only ones who escape with their lives. On the run, Emma is tragically separated from Charlie. For the next hundred years, she plays a cat-and-mouse game with the founding members of the Church of Light and their descendants.