Blimp HQ Recon

"Behold, Clock-La is born."

- Clock-La

"Blimp HQ Recon" was a job for Sly Cooper in "Anatomy for Disaster" of Sly 2: Band of Thieves.

Background
Sly must sneak into Arpeggio's blimp HQ and stop him from rebuilding Clockwerk.

Synopsis
Sly heads to a smaller blimp floating next to the giant flying fortress. Bentley is detecting large magnetic fields coming from that blimp. He's come to the conclusion that if Arpeggio has already started re-constructing Clockwerk, then that's where he'll be. Bentley needs Sly to take some recon photos so they can find out how close Arpeggio is to re-building Clockwerk, so he can come up with an appropriate plan.

Sly paraglides over to the wing of the blimp and sneaks in through a vent. Once inside, they see that Arpeggio has already rebuilt Clockwerk. However, he is still completely inanimate. Sly takes photos of a spinning magnetic inducer, some mech eggs, and Clockwerk's head, as they seem important to the procedure. Bentley tells him to stay away from the guards, as they won't have time for a second chance.

After taking the photos, Bentley detects voices from the front of the blimp. Sly heads up to the windows and spots Neyla with Arpeggio. Bentley believes the two have been working together all along. Sly snaps photos of them as well. After that, Bentley comes to the conclusion that Neyla and Arpeggio have conspired together to rebuild Clockwerk, and are dangerously close to realizing their goal. Sly gets Bentley to quickly think of a way to stop Clockwerk from being rebuilt. Bentley explains that the spinning inducers are keeping the parts held together. If Sly can get up to each platform at the top of their rotation, he will be able to reverse their polarity and pull Clockwerk apart. However, he must pickpocket a few keys to the inducer's control station.

After he reverses the polarity of all inducers, Clockwerk falls down, creating a blast that destroys all of the equipment in the area... and killing the guards if any are around. However, Clockwerk remains intact and is glowing. The blast alerts Neyla and Arpeggio. The two walk out to investigate. Arpeggio notices the magnets had been reversed, but is pleased that the Clockwerk parts were locked into place. Sly hides behind the archway as they walk down and then exposes himself. Neyla assumes he is the one responsible. Arpeggio, however, is grateful, knowing he'll be able to hop into the frame and be born anew. Sly calls him pathetic for doing all of this for the sake of being able to fly. Arpeggio explains that it's immortality that he seeks, and that the other Klaww Gang members saw the parts for nothing more than just a way to drive their various, trivial schemes. Arpeggio, however, saw the parts for what they really were, the keys to life eternal.

Sly then realizes that it was Arpeggio who was behind everything. He was the one who had Neyla put him on the scent back in Cairo. He then waited for Sly to steal the parts from the other Klaww Gang members, so that way he would be able to have all of the parts for himself. However, Arpeggio states that stealing all of the parts was only half the equation, and then reminds Sly that Clockwerk's hatred is what kept him alive for thousands of years. Sly tells him that he cannot make people hate, but Arpeggio claims that he has found a way.

Arpeggio explains that spice consumption makes people angry and susceptible to hypnosis, as Murray would attest. He then explains that he created the blimp to be a massive transmitter of the flashing lights the Contessa used for her hypnosis. The only issue he had was finding a suitable source of light waves. Therefore, he used Jean Bison to obtain energy from the Northern Lights in order to hypnotize people on the ground who had eaten spice. Thanks to Dimitri and his nightclub, the people of Paris consumed food covered in spice. Arpeggio is now flying his blimp to Paris to unleash a hypnotic light show of hate. Sly tells him his plan is outlandishly cruel, but Arpeggio says that it is necessary to give Clockwerk his spark of immortality.

Ready to try out his new body, Arpeggio heads for Clockwerk, telling Neyla to keep Sly at bay, but Neyla knocks him down. She calls him stupid for thinking she wouldn't betray him, like she did everyone else. She then hops into Clockwerk, and right after Arpeggio commands her to exit, she kills him. She then dubs herself as "Clock-La", and flies out of the blimp, smashing through the windows. With her out and free to terrorize the world, Sly heads back to the battery, so the gang can figure out how to take her down.