Diana Sydney's Rebellion

Diana Sydney's Rebellion
Type	Rebellion
Location	The Ark, Earth orbit
Date	13th September - 1st October 2149 (18 days)
Season	One
Episode	Pilot - Unity Day
Participants	Sky People (Ark Government, Sydney's Rebels)

“	This Exodus ship belongs to all of you. You're the future of the human race, and today, I'm going to lead you home.	”
— Diana's speech to her rebels after taking the Exodus Ship

Diana Sydney's Rebellion was an event that occurred during Season One, taking place on the orbital space station known as The Ark.

Former Chancellor Diana Sydney attempted to overthrow The Ark's government. To that end, she arranged for Bellamy to attempt the assassination of Chancellor Jaha. Later, Diana leveraged The Culling event to gain support among the working class. Later after failing to kill Chancellor Jaha and all council members during Unity Day celebrations, Diana and her followers take over the Exodus ship.

The rebellion ended with the Exodus ship crashing into the ground and killing Diana and all her loyalists. Diana actions resulted in The Ark losing power and air, which forced the remaining Sky People to come to the ground.

Background

After Diana lost the election to Jaha, Diana, angry that she was usurped as leader of the Ark, gathered a faction of followers to regain the power she lost. Diana plotted to have Jaha killed and the rest of the Council branded as murderers over their plan to reduce the population so she could kill them and take over.

Events

• Season One

In Pilot, Chancellor Thelonious Jaha is shot and Shumway gives the acting Chancellor, Marcus Kane, the name of Jaha's shooter: Bellamy Blake. Shumway tries to convince Kane to start population reduction to save oxygen, but Kane says if he is going to order the deaths of hundreds of people, he is going to do it by the book. Jaha is later revealed to have survived thanks to the efforts of Dr. Abigail Griffin, who was almost floated for using exceeding the maximum amount of blood allowed.

In His Sister's Keeper, it is shown in a flashback that Diana gave the job of killing Jaha to one of her guardsmen, Commander Shumway. After hearing about the Council's decision to send the 100 to Earth, Shumway used this to convince Bellamy, then a janitor and former guardsmen cadet Shumway knew, to kill Jaha. In exchange for killing Jaha with a gun Shumway supplied, Shumway would sneak him onto the dropship so he could be with his sister Octavia Blake.

In Contents Under Pressure Diana uses the recent Culling to recruit more followers and paint the Council in a negative light, especially after discovering the 100 are alive and the Earth is survivable. Diana visits Jaha in his office and paints herself as a voice of the 'lower classes'. She warns him to get in front of allegations that they let those people die for nothing and notice he has reactivated Project Exodus. In response, Diana has Ridley, whose wife died in the culling, push the people against the Council so she could manipulate Jaha into giving her Abby's vacant council seat at a general assembly. Ridley tries to cast mistrust in Jaha at the meeting, claiming he knows nothing of their lose, but it backfires when Jaha screams that his own son Wells is dead, silencing Ridley. Diana takes a new approach and offers her condolences before painting the losses as a means to return to the ground and her plan works, Jaha gives her Abby's seat.

In Day Trip Diana attends a Council meeting where she attempts to dissuade the 100 from going to an old emergency aid depot for the winter, presumedly planning to use it for her own people, but is overruled by Jaha. Commander Shumway later forces Dax to listen to his proposal. He offers Dax his mother a seat on the first transport to Earth and his choice of assignment when Shumway himself gets there, if Dax kills Bellamy to silence him. Dax fails and Jaha pardons Bellamy in exchange for information about the assassination attempt. This leads to the arrest and imprisonment of Shumway. Diana visits Shumway in his cell and Shumway thinks he is getting sprung, but Diana has Lieutenant Graco shock lash Shumway to knock him out, break a light bulb and use the glass to slit Shumway's wrists, killing him and staging it like a suicide.

In Unity Day, Diana sets up a bombing targeting the council during the Unity Day pageant. To ensure Jaha is in the vicinity, Diana helps Jaha with his speech, making sure it is long enough so he will still be talking when the bomb goes off. On the day of the pageant, the bomb kills four council members and two citizens, but fails to kill Jaha because he cut his speech short and Kane survives as well while his mother dies. Diana meets with Lieutenant Graco and Cuyler Ridley to discuss their next move. Graco reveals they already suspect her involvement since Diana left early and have two options: stay and fight with all the guards and workers they can convince to join them or take the Exodus ship by force and cripple the Ark. Diane decides to take the Exodus ship even knowing doing so is a virtual death sentence for everyone else left on the Ark.

To distract the remaining council members, Diana has Ridley confess to planting the bomb and gives Kane the info. Diana sends a signal to her people to attack and they succeed in taking control of the Exodus ship. After less than 50% of Diana's loyalists gather onto the Exodus ship they seal the doors and start siphoning power from the Ark to prepare to launch and orders anyone else thrown back onto the Ark. Ridley finds Abby hiding behind some crate and Diana tries to convince her to join them so they have a doctor on the ground, but Abby unlocks the doors instead, allowing Jaha and a group of loyal guard and Ark citizens, including Sinclair and Red, to pry it open. Diana reveals the Exodus ships can't get everyone to the ground and convinces Red to betray everyone for a chance to get to the ground. Once the doors close, Diana gives the order to launch the Exodus ship, crippling the Ark and killing over a thousand people in the process. The Exodus ship descends to Earth but fails to deploy it's parachutes and crashes, killing Diana and all her loyalists. It is later revealed that Mount Weather caused the Exodus ship to crash by jamming their navigational system.

Aftermath

Main article: Coalition-Skaikru Conflicts

Diana's actions left The Ark crippled and an estimated 1,500 Sky People died and everyone loyal to her on the exodus ship died when it crashed, including her. The Delinquents were able to use the hydrazine fuel from the crash to make a bomb they used in their war with the Grounders. The remaining citizens on the Ark, which might include some of the 50% of Diana's followers that Diana abandoned on the Ark, would have perished too if Jaha didn't come up with the plan to propel the Ark itself to send the people left to the ground. Many died as a result, but people on the Alpha, Mecha, Farm, Hydra, and Factory Stations are confirmed to have made it to the ground. Even Jaha manages to get to the ground himself after he launches himself in a missile from the Ark. After that the rest of the citizens are in one way enthralled in the war with the Grounders.

Known Participants

Notable members among the factions include:

Ark Government

• Chancellor Thelonious Jaha^†
• Councilor Marcus Kane^†
• Dr. Abigail Griffin^† (former councilor)
• Jacapo Sinclair^†
• Red^† (formerly, defected)
• Majority of Arkers

Sydney's Rebels

After Diana lost the election, Diana started gathering a small group of rebels in an attempt to overthrow the government. This included a handful of guards and, after the Culling, a group of workers and engineers.

• Councilor Diana Sydney^†
• Commander Shumway^†
• Lieutenant Graco^†
• Cuyler Ridley^†
• Bellamy Blake (formerly, defected)
• Dax^†
• Around 200 Ark Guard and workers

Casualties

Main article: Body Count

Sydney's Rebels

• Dax - Stabbed in the neck by Bellamy with a bullet trying to kill him.
• Commander Shumway - Shock lashed and wrists slit by Lieutenant Graco.
• Approximately 100 people in the Exodus ship crash - Crashed due to system failure caused by interference from the Mountain Men.
  • Diana Sydney
  • Cuyler Ridley
  • Lieutenant Graco
  • Red

Ark Government

• Unity Day Bombing - Planted by Cuyler Ridley to target the Council and Jaha:
  • Unnamed Arker
  • Vera Kane
  • Councilor Cole
  • Councilor Kaplan
  • Councilor Muir
  • Councilor Fuji
• Approximately 1,500 people on the Ark - Killed after the Ark lost power due to Diana rushing to launch the Exodus ship.

Quotes

Quotes

Kane: "You're a disgrace." Shumway: "I'm fighting for what I believe in, just like you." Kane: "What, exactly, is that?" - in Day Trip Lieutenant Graco: "They suspect it was you. The way I see it, we got two choices. Stay and fight, in which case maybe we win if we can get enough workers to join us." Cuyler Ridley: "And if we don't, what's the second choice?" Diana Sydney: "Take the Exodus ship now." Cuyler Ridley: "It's not ready." Diana Sydney: "Can our engineers get it ready?" Cuyler Ridley: "To charge the batteries on a ship that size without causing a disruption to The Ark takes time." Lieutenant Graco: "Then cause disruptions." Cuyler Ridley: "It'll get cold. With the lockdown, even if they find a way to isolate the lesser populated stations, people will die." Lieutenant Graco: "So there's casualties either way." Diana Sydney: "Take the Exodus ship. We should have built a bigger bomb." - in Unity Day Kane: "You were seen planting the bomb, Ridley. You killed six people." Cuyler Ridley: "Should have been seven. Jaha's lucky he cut his speech short." Kane: "I know you're upset about what happened at Section Seventeen." Cuyler Ridley: "I lost my wife. You're damn right I'm upset, but this is about more than the culling. Workers all over the Ark are tired of getting screwed. It's our kids you sent to die on Earth and who's on the first dropship? Not us. Over and over Jaha and the rest of you on the Council betray our trust. Today is your reckoning." Kane: "Tell me. Who helped you? I know you didn't act alone." Cuyler Ridley: "You don't know jack. You still think this is just about the Chancellor. - in Unity Day Jaha: "Diana, please! You don't want to be remembered like this!" Diana Sydney: "I won't be because you brought this on yourself, Jaha. You promised the people truth, and all you gave them were lies!" Jaha: "You had me shot! You detonated a bomb in a public meeting, killing six innocent people, and now you want to kill everyone on this space station to satisfy your ego?" Diana Sydney: "He is still lying to your face. There aren't enough dropships to get everyone to the ground." Red: "What is she talking about?" Jaha: "Trust me, we will figure this out. We will survive, we always do! Go! Come on!" Diana Sydney: "You can't trust him. More than one thousand people, most of them workers like you, are gonna be left behind to die. You can still save yourself." - in Unity Day

Notes and Trivia

• This is the first of the two known internal conflicts between Sky People, the second being the Arkadian Civil War.
• This is the first conflict to be fought in both Space and the Earth, the second being the conflict between Wonkru-Spacekru and the Eligius IV Prisoners.

Gallery

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