Jiaying

"Your mother was special because she had a gift. She comes from a line of people who have gifts. You have a gift. It’s why I brought you here, so you can receive it. It’s your birthright. There’s a transformation… a change that has to happen."

- Calvin Zabo to Skye

Jiaying was an Inhuman who was gifted with longevity after experiencing Terrigenesis. Thanks to her ability, she was able to guide a number of Inhumans throughout dozens of generations, helping them in coping with their powers and in time harnessing them. She worked in a clinic alongside her husband, Calvin Zabo, in China, and had a daughter whom they named Daisy. Jiaying was killed by Werner Reinhardt because he desired her apparent immortality.

World War II
"No. Please, don't. Don't do this."

- Jiaying

Near the end of World War II, Jiaying was captured by Werner Reinhardt and used as an unwilling test subject to discover the abilities of the Diviner. When she survived her contact with the Diviner, Reinhardt sought to have her experimented on to discover why she could safely touch the artifact. However, with the Allies rapidly approaching, Reinhardt was forced to flee, but not before ordering Jiaying to be locked in a cage. She would later be found and freed by a Strategic Scientific Reserve team led by Peggy Carter.

Mother Figure
"It's going to be okay, beautiful; I'll show you the way."

- Jiaying to Gordon

By 1983, Jiaying was the mother figure of those Inhumans who emerged confused after Terrigenesis. Her power of longevity allowed her to help many generations of young Inhumans adapt to their metamorphosis. One such person was Gordon who lost his eyes upon emergence. She calmed him and got him to control his power of teleportation.

Family
Jiaying fell in love with Calvin Zabo, a medic who opened a clinic in the village. Since his Chinese was poor, she helped with translations. In April of 1989, the couple had a baby girl they named Daisy, as she often sang the song  to her baby. The pair lived together in her village in the Hunan Province of China, where she was considered a village elder; the locals were aware of her unusual nature and true age.

Found by HYDRA
"What did you take from her, sir?" "Everything that I possibly could. Dispose of the rest."

- Hauer and Werner Reinhardt

In 1989, Jiaying was one of the elders of the Chinese village where the Diviner was found, and was among those who were brought to Austria by HYDRA operatives operating within S.H.I.E.L.D. After Reinhardt learned that she was alive and physically unaged, he was finally able to experiment on her. She died as a result of the subsequent surgery, which involved the removal of her organs and bodily fluids. Although Reinhardt was unable to find out why she survived touching the Diviner, the experimentation was still beneficial as he was able to use her DNA to regress his body back to a younger age. Unbeknownst to Reinhardt, the body of Jiaying was discovered by her husband, who swore vengeance on the people who killed her.

Ever-changing Story
S.H.I.E.L.D. agents Phil Coulson and Melinda May went to Mexico City to obtain information about Skye's Father and Mother from Richard Lumley, the only living agent with first hand knowledge of Skye's origins.

According to Lumley, in 1991, a team of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents was assigned to extract an 0-8-4 from a village in the Hunan Province. The team was massacred along with the entire village except for a baby.

A second team was sent that included Lumley and Linda Avery to investigate. They learned that the villagers were killed by monsters seeking their child. The team found the child in the arms of the original team's lead agent, who was dead. Agent Avery eventually sent the child to Saint Agnes Orphanage, where she would be named Mary Sue Poots. Later, Poots changed her name to Skye.

Coulson and May did not tell Skye that her mother might be a monster.

Upon learning that Grant Ward might know her origin, Skye talked to him while he was imprisoned in Vault D, the prison in the basement of the S.H.I.E.L.D. base known as the Playground.

According to Ward, when Skye was a baby, a group of HYDRA agents came to the small Chinese village, attempting to abduct her. Her mother attempted to protect her and was killed in the struggle. When Skye's father discovered what had happened, he went into a murderous rage and slaughtered everyone in the village.

Family Reunion
Calvin Zabo told Skye her origins and that he knew Daniel Whitehall killed his wife in 1989, when they were reunited by Grant Ward in the Ponce de León Theater‏‎ in San Juan. He explained that he was working for Whitehall to see Skye and to exact his revenge for her mother's death.

Whitehall forced Skye, at gunpoint, to touch the Diviner; when he saw that she was not petrified by the artifact, he told her that her mother could touch it as well. He revealed to her that her mother did not age physically over time and wondered if Skye had this power as well. He contemplated experimenting on her to learn the answer.

Powers
Jiaying was an Inhuman and obtained superhuman powers and attributes when exposed to the Terrigen Mist.
 * Longevity: Jiaying retained her youthful appearance for over 40 years until she was vivisected and killed by Werner Reinhardt. She could not live forever and did still age, just at a much slower rate than humans.

Abilities

 * Bilingual: Jiaying was fluent in both Chinese and English.

Family

 * Calvin Zabo - Husband
 * Daisy - Daughter

Allies

 * Yat-Sen
 * Gordon

Enemies

 * HYDRA
 * Daniel Whitehall † - Killer
 * Hauer - Disposer

Appearances
In chronological order:
 * Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.
 * Season Two
 * The Things We Bury (WWII flashbacks)
 * Aftershocks (1983 flashbacks)
 * The Things We Bury (1989 flashbacks)
 * A Fractured House (mentioned)
 * What They Become (mentioned)
 * One of Us (mentioned)
 * Afterlife
 * Melinda

Trivia

 * In the comics, Daisy Johnson's mother was named Kim Johnson. Unlike Jiaying, Kim was not an Inhuman, Chinese or Calvin Zabo's wife but a Caucasian prostitute, with whom Zabo had regular "business".