AYIANA: An Ancient woman millions of years old, whom scientists found frozen
in the ice of Antarctica.
Ayiana was from the ancient race that built the Stargate network millennia ago,
and showed remarkable abilities from her advanced evolution.
But she also carried a deadly illness that threatened the lives of Jack O’Neill
and the SG-1 team.
In the sixth year of Stargate operations on Earth, scientists working at a remote outpost
in Antarctica made an astounding discovery: a woman, entirely human in appearance,
frozen in the ice.
This discovery was made closeby to where Stargate Command had discovered a second Stargate
inside a frozen cave more than four years earlier.
This gate was believed to be much older than the Stargate found in Egypt in 1928.
In fact, it is one of the oldest in the entire Milky Way gate network –
perhaps as much as 50 million years old.
The proximity of the frozen woman to this Stargate suggested that she too may have lived
many eons ago, even before humans evolved on Earth.
Ice core samples prove she is at least 3 million years old, and probably older.
This would not only make her one of the Ancients – the race who built the Stargates –
but prove that human beings evolved to look exactly like them.
Did the Ancients seed their form to evolve again,
millions of years after they moved on from this part of space?
The woman in the ice could hold the secrets to human existence itself.
She was named “Ayiana” by one of the scientists, Dr. Francine Michaels,
a Cherokee word meaning “eternal bloom.”
SG-1 joined the team of researchers in Antarctica, only to find that the frozen woman
was showing signs of life.
They rapidly defrosted her from her icy prison, and got a heartbeat.
Ayiana, millions of years old, was alive.
With help from a kind and patient friend in Jonas Quinn, Ayiana began to speak
and to understand.
She could not communicate who she was or where she was from,
but she did appear to have some familiarity with the Stargate.
AYIANA: “A-maz-ing.”
In time, SG-1 and the research team discovered still more amazing things about this woman
from the distant past.
Thanks to the Ancients' millions of years of evolution, her cells had an incredible
ability to heal themselves.
The Ancients must have been remarkably long-lived in their time.
This is what allowed Ayiana to survive so many years in the ice, and even now her physical
injuries healed themselves in a matter of hours or minutes.
When a member of the research party was lost in a storm and came back near death,
Ayiana realized that she could save his life.
She moved as if by instinct, showing that she had the ability to extend her healing
powers to others through touch.
Ayiana was indeed one of the Ancients, a race of humans who long ago were known as "Alterans."
They migrated to the Milky Way from their home galaxy, building the Stargates
and seeding human life throughout the galaxy.
They made allies of the Asgard, the Nox, and the Furlings, and built great cities
capable of interstellar flight.
In their travels through the Stargate, SG-1 had already learned some limited information
about the Ancients.
That included their apparent fate: a deadly plague had wiped out whole colonies long ago.
Even with their vast knowledge of the universe, the Ancients could not find a way
to combat the virus and heal their people.
Ayiana too, it seems, was infected by this plague.
Her healing abilities were enough to fight off the infection in her own system moment
by moment and keep her alive, but not enough to eradicate the disease completely.
Millions of years ago she lived in the city of Atlantis, when it was located
on the surface of the Earth.
When the city was launched to take the surviving Ancients to start fresh in the Pegasus Galaxy,
Ayiana (and perhaps others who were infected) was left behind.
It was not long after the scientists thawed her out in the present day
that they too fell ill.
The virus was unleashed and began spreading from person to person at the Antarctic outpost,
with Dr. Michaels and then the others falling ill – including SG-1.
The base was put under quarantine, with a grim prognosis for everyone ...
until Ayiana again intervened.
She used her ability to heal Dr. Michaels and the others, though each one
proved more difficult for her than the last.
Ayiana’s healing power was a fine resource, and she was drained each time she used it
to help someone else.
Her compassion pushed her to the brink, so far that Ayiana herself
was unable to recover from the strain.
After managing to save the lives of everyone at the outpost, except for Colonel Jack O’Neill,
Ayiana expressed regret that she could not do more.
She was transported to Stargate Command, where she died, and with her
the last known living Ancient passed into memory.
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