Neyla

"You won't stop me! Not the Cooper Gang, not INTERPOL, not anyone!"

- Neyla, after she is defeated by Bentley's RC chopper

Constable, later Captain, Neyla was a violet Bengal tiger, and the main antagonist of Sly 2: Band of Thieves. She was at one time a partial ally to the Cooper Gang, as well as a member of INTERPOL.

Manipulative and deceitful, Neyla double-crossed most individuals she affiliated herself with—namely the Cooper Gang, INTERPOL, and Carmelita Fox—in order to achieve her ultimate goal of immortality. After betraying her former mentor, Arpeggio, she merged with Clockwerk's robotic frame and became Clock-La.

She was voiced by.

Early life
Neyla grew up a poor child in New Delhi, India. After some time, she left her old life and scammed her way into a British university. While there, she used her strong powers of persuasion to get other students to do her work for her. Eventually, this "homework ring" was discovered and she was caught. Rather than arrest Neyla, however, the authorities were impressed by her abilities; they believed she could get into the mind of the criminal and subsequently offered her a job at INTERPOL.

Sometime before the events of Sly 2: Band of Thieves, Neyla met Arpeggio, who was a member of the Klaww Gang. She gained Arpeggio's trust, and he named her his protégée. The two then formed a plan to gather the parts of the ancient robotic owl known as Clockwerk for themselves; both of them were well aware that the Clockwerk parts were the keys to immortality. However, Neyla had a plan of her own that would leave Arpeggio with nothing and her with immortality.

Directing Sly
"That Constable Neyla... was her reference to the Klaww Gang just a slip of the tongue, or an intentional clue? Either way, it's my only lead on the missing Clockwerk parts."

- Sly pondering after first meeting Neyla

With Neyla's strong position in INTERPOL and her trust within the Klaww Gang, she could gather the Clockwerk parts one by one. After the parts were stolen and divided among the Klaww Gang, Neyla joined Carmelita Fox at the Museum of Natural History in Cairo, Egypt. While Carmelita was there to bust Sly Cooper, Neyla was there for a different reason. After Carmelita accused Sly and his gang of stealing the parts, Neyla indirectly hinted to Sly that the modus operandi pointed to the heist being a Klaww Gang job. Carmelita disagreed and Neyla stalled her with a counter-argument so that Sly was able to escape with the information.

Neyla ended up in Paris where both the Cooper Gang and Dimitri Lousteau, the first member of the Klaww Gang, were set up. She intercepted Sly as he traveled around Paris and told him that he needed to "keep up." She led him to the back door of Dimitri's nightclub and gave him the key, claiming that she couldn't enter without a warrant, but that Sly's gang was not held to such standards. This eventually led to Dimitri being jailed and his part of Clockwerk, the tail feathers, were collected by the gang.

Betraying the Cooper Gang


Both Neyla and the Cooper Gang ended up in India at Rajan's party. Working undercover with Carmelita and the Contessa she was seemingly conspiring with them to expose Rajan's spice trade; a pivotal component to the Klaww Gang's plans. Neyla remained in the crowd until Sly needed her help: under his advisement she danced with him in order to make Carmelita jealous, which therefore caused her to accept his offer for a dance sometime later. This dance acted as a distraction to all those in the room and allowed Murray to cut the Clockwerk wings free and get them to the Cooper Van. Neyla then helped Sly collect half of the Clockwerk heart in Rajan's spice temple and accepted his offer to go on a date to Bollywood. She ended up betraying Sly, Murray and Carmelita by imprisoning them in the Contessa's estate. She couldn't catch Bentley, who eventually rescued his fellow team members.

After the Contessa was exposed as a member of the Klaww Gang, she fled to her castle. As Neyla was closest to the case, INTERPOL provided her with the means to take the Contessa down. Neyla saw this as an opportunity to obtain the Clockwerk eyes, and she established her headquarters in an old bank near the castle. She used her cash allowance to hire an army of local mercenaries and precipitated a small war in Prague. She later hired a team of aerial bombers when she believed that the Contessa had infested her headquarters with ghosts. Unbeknownst to her, it was actually the Cooper Gang who had done so. Despite all her firepower, Neyla was unable to get the Contessa to leave her re-education tower (or the Clockwerk eyes). It was not until the Cooper Gang freed Carmelita during "Operation: High Road" that the Contessa finally left the tower. Neyla took this opportunity to enter the re-education tower and stole one of the Clockwerk eyes.

Sly chased Neyla to get the eye, and at some point during the chase, she ran into a web and got stuck. Sly took the Eye. Neyla demanded that Sly give it back to her, but she was promptly thrown off the building by the Contessa. The Contessa then engaged in a fight with Sly but was defeated. Neyla took the credit for defeating the Contessa and was promoted to Captain as a result. She followed the Cooper Gang to Nunavut Bay, Canada and used her newly acquired airplane to attack Sly while he was on Iron Horse train #3. She was defeated by Bentley, who used his RC chopper to severely damage Neyla's plane. Before losing control and flying off, Neyla declared that no one would stand in her way of obtaining the Clockwerk parts. Later, Neyla ordered a manhunt on the Cooper Gang and Carmelita (who had also followed the Gang in an attempt to capture them and clear her name).

With the final phase of Neyla's plan nearing, she took shelter on board Arpeggio's air fortress, where they both waited for the Clockwerk parts. Jean Bison, a member of the Klaww Gang operating the Canadian camp, knocked the Cooper Gang out during their attempted heist, raided their supposed Safe House and sold all of the Clockwerk Parts to Arpeggio. Whilst the Cooper Gang came to terms with their massive loss and sneaked aboard the blimp, Neyla and Arpeggio began constructing Clockwerk.

Betraying Arpeggio
"Stupid Arpeggio. I double crossed the Cooper Gang, INTERPOL and Carmelita... what made you think I wouldn't do the same to you?"

- Neyla



Bentley located Arpeggio, and it was there that the Cooper Gang discovered that Neyla had been in league with him the entire time. The Cooper Gang attempted to stall Clockwerk's construction by reversing the polarity of the magnetic inducers holding Clockwerk together. However their efforts, funnily enough, worked to Arpeggio and Neyla's advantage: Bentley's plan backfired and locked Clockwerk's parts into place. Sly revealed himself after Neyla and Arpeggio came out to investigate the crash of the Clockwerk parts falling. Neyla let Arpeggio compose a diatribe about his master plan and waited quietly until the time was right. Once Arpeggio finished revealing his master plan to Sly, he ordered Neyla to hold Sly down while he began to enter the Clockwerk frame.

However, Neyla betrayed Arpeggio, knocked his actuating apparatus to the floor, and finally revealed her own plans. She called Arpeggio stupid for not knowing she would double-cross him (like she did with the others) and entered the Clockwerk frame herself, becoming Clock-La. Arpeggio tried to threaten her, but she was far more superior than him and crushed him with her beak, killing him. While taking flight she proclaimed, "Behold, Clock-La is born!" and escaped from the blimp.

Clock-La was now on the last stage of her plan. Using the Klaww Gang's plans, she would gain immortality through Clockwerk's powers. Dimitri had fed almost all of Paris a special spice which engendered a strong hatred, while Arpeggio had created a large hypnotic light ray to hypnotize all of Paris to power Clockwerk into immortality using the collective hatred of the Parisian citizens as an energy source. Carmelita returned and realized that, in order to defeat Neyla, she and the Cooper Gang had to put their differences aside and work together.

To initiate Clock-La's downfall, Sly and Carmelita teamed up in a dog fight against Clock-La, who used most of Clockwerk's powers to her advantage. Sly and Carmelita had the upper hand until Neyla flew directly into the core of air fortress and blew it into fragments. Afterwards, Clock-La became angry, and then grabbed the hangar that Murray and Bentley were in and began flying away, knowing that Sly would follow her to rescue his teammates. Sly jumped out of the helicopter and made his way over to Clock-La using his paraglider. When he managed to actually land on Clock-La herself, he matched her in personal combat. Sly easily gained the upper hand, as Neyla was heavily limited in her attack options. Sly delivered a final blow, and Neyla crashed into Paris. Now unable to move, Neyla began speaking in her own disbelief (much like Clockwerk in the first game). She then summoned lasers all around her to defend herself, possibly so she could heal (akin to what Clockwerk attempted to achieve two years earlier).

Death
"It was as if nothing could ever hurt them."

- Sly referring to Clock-La's metallic body



Now with the upper hand, the Cooper Gang began tearing away at her main power source. Bentley was about to deactivate Clock-La's main power source — the hate chip — when Clock-La's beak fell on him, paralyzing Bentley's legs. As Murray picked up Bentley and ran, Clock-La exploded. Minutes later, Sly realized that even after the long drawn out battle, Clock-La's parts was in perfect condition, despite her body being fragmented.

Carmelita showed up, angered at missing Clock-La. She destroyed Clock-La's Hate Chip as it was the only thing on hand. As it was the main source of her power and immortality, the Clockwerk Parts rusted and deteriorated as time finally caught up to them, ending both Neyla and Clockwerk, eliminating their threat.

Legacy
The most notable scar that Neyla left on the Cooper Gang was paralyzing Bentley, even though she didn't actually plan it out. This also left Murray psychologically scarred for quite some time, leaving the gang for a few months for some deep pacifist training under The Guru's teachings. Eventually, Bentley and Murray got past that dark chapter in their lives although they would never quite forget it. Her permanent paralyzation of Bentley and mental scarring of Murray were foreshadowed by several of Clockwerk's final words to Sly two years ago: "Cooper! You will never be rid of me!"

Physical appearance
Neyla was a Bengal tiger with violet fur, shoulder-length black hair and markings. In Sly 2, she wore head jewelry, a red and golden decorated hijab, wields a whip and, during a dance with Sly Cooper, could be seen to have long black hair. She had green eyes, a rare eye color. These eyes turned yellow and more closely resembled Clockwerk's eyes after she became Clock-La, as seen on the hologram of Neyla's face that was projected inside Clock-La's beak. She also wore a dark blue tank top, brown shorts with a blue belt and gold buckle to hold them up, and a small pair of brown boots.

Personality
"You might have a new body, Neyla, but you're still the low-down, back-stabbing coward we've beaten time and time again. This won't be any different."

- Sly insulting Clock-La just before bringing her down. Neyla's outside appearance was very charming; she would be so generous as to be used for two of Sly Cooper's plans (first for the key to Dimitri's disco, then at the ballroom dance in India). She appeared to the Cooper Gang as a cop who was close to the line of being an honest cop to a vigilante. She showed her true colors: a deceiving, cunning liar. She was a manipulative schemer and held no social activity for long. Anyone she befriended would usually be used then tossed aside. It is possible that to her, being just a normal person like everyone else just wasn't enough as she sought the body of Clockwerk (which she did obtain).

Abilities
Neyla could easily rival Sly in his abilities to sprint and perform feats of acrobatic prowess. She was arguably a pro with her whip, never injuring herself once and taking out her foes in just one hit. She could perform a high level of psychological warfare; she could charm anyone she met and had a unique talent beyond many other people to hide her true motives, no matter how big they were — no one could guess the truth in her mind.

When she changed her body to Clock-La, her powers were enhanced to the level of Clockwerk's, so she possessed his abilities. Like the original Clockwerk, Clock-La could fire missiles and energy rings. One difference was that the rings that Clock-La fired closed up with energy, resulting in the need that the rings had to be shot in order to open. Clock-La also had upgraded missiles; one type could required to be shot twice in order to be destroyed prior to reaching the helicopter. Clock-La can also fire an energy blast that can severely damage Carmelita Fox's helicopter.

Sly Cooper
At first, Sly seemed to have a thing for Neyla since she worked differently from other INTERPOL officers, realizing that a thief could go places that an officer without a permit or warrant couldn't. He even had the thought of taking her on a date in Bollywood. Sly thought that their cooperation was the best thing to happen, until she betrayed him, the rest of the gang and Carmelita.

Carmelita Fox
Carmelita did not seem to get along with Neyla as she claimed that she only allowed her to participate in the case as a favor to the Contessa and that she didn't need her help, hinting that she wished to get rid of her. Neyla later took the opportunity to get Carmelita (along with Sly and Murray) arrested by claiming she was working with the Cooper Gang the entire time.

Arpeggio
At some point, Neyla met Arpeggio and the two formed a plan to gather the Clockwerk Parts in order to achieve immortality. Despite their partnership, Neyla never truly intended to help Arpeggio become one with Clockwerk, instead planning herself to become immortal. She fully reveals this plan on the blimp when she betrays Arpeggio instead of holding off Sly, taunting Arpeggio about his naive trust in her. Upon entering the Clockwerk Frame and thus becoming Clock-La, Neyla unhesitatingly swoops down and kills Arpeggio when her incapacitated mentor tries to threaten her.

Neyla's mercenaries
Neyla had two kinds of mercenaries while battling The Contessa in "A Tangled Web": tanks and warplanes. Neyla hired them to defeat the Contessa. All of them are quite powerful, despite being limited to ground power and air power. They can only be found in Prague.

Tanks​
These heavy tanks have blue lights mounted on the turrets. When you enter their light, these tanks park themselves when they attack and then fire several times. While shooting, the other tanks nearby begin to realize a target is around and thus the firepower gets stronger. To defeat them, you need a tank of your own and then fire three times in a row.

Warplanes
These warplanes are super fast and strong. If one of them sees you, it tosses out a stick of dynamite from above that takes out a massive amount of health. They'll sometimes get in Sly's way when you try to Paraglide around the castle, but won't harm you otherwise. To actually take them down, you need the machine gun mounted on the Contessa's blimp. They must be shot down quickly before they get too close and attack with bullets of their own.

Trivia

 * Like Sly, she has a paraglider. It is identical to her hijab and emerges/retracts from where this sits, implying that this was intended to be her means of paragliding itself; however, while paragliding, it is still on her head, likely an animation oversight.
 * Neyla is one of five female villains in the series, the other four being Mz. Ruby, The Contessa, Penelope, and Miss Decibel, but she is the only female final boss and the only one to be deceased.
 * Neyla is the first female main antagonist. She is also the only main antagonist in the series who doesn't have a vendetta against the Cooper Clan.
 * Neyla is the first main antagonist to be killed or defeated by Carmelita rather than Sly, the second being Dr. M.
 * While Neyla was inside of Clockwerk's body calling herself Clock-La, she boasted to Sly: "I might not have the immortality born of pure hate... but I feel something... some power growing within me!" This, along with her sudden drastic change in personality, suggests that Clockwerk's mind and soul were still alive in the frame and gradually took over Neyla's.
 * Jean Bison is the only character whom Neyla never back-stabbed, or put an end to their operation, though she likely tried to do so.
 * Neyla is the only main antagonist who neither holds a grudge against nor has any personal history with the Cooper Family.
 * Her whip can kill guards in a single hit, making it one of the most powerful attacks in the game.
 * Neyla is the only non-Cooper Clan member who is seen walking across tight-ropes.
 * She did run quickly across them, implying she could not remain on them indefinitely like Sly or any other Cooper.
 * In Anatomy for Disaster, Neyla becomes the third villain to refer to Sly as an insect after Raleigh and The Contessa, however Raleigh prefers to use the term "bug."
 * She is the only mini-boss in Sly 2.

Behind the Scenes
Neyla was originally designed to be Rajan's daughter, though this had to be changed to simplify the story. This also explains why they are the same species of tiger. Her name was also originally supposed to be spelled "Neela" instead of "Neyla."

Appearances

 * Sly 2: Band of Thieves
 * P. "A Shadow from the Past"
 * 1. "The Black Chateau"
 * 2. "A Starry Eyed Encounter"
 * 3. "The Predator Awakes"
 * 5. "A Tangled Web"
 * 6. "He Who Tames the Iron Horse"
 * 8. "Anatomy for Disaster"