I've been everywhere man

Garbo is a humanoid robot with a trash bag for a head and two round, expressive eyes. Her trash bag head is a light gray, tied at the top with a knot that resembles rabbit ears. On the back of his head, three vertical lines of red text repeat the phrase "Thank you!" a familiar design we often see on real-life grocery bags. Her eyes feature pastel-yellow sclera with simple black pupils. The right eye has three eyelashes along the bottom, while the left eye has none. Garbo wears a red T-shirt (not shown in the in-game model) layered beneath a makeshift cardboard chest plate. Over it, they have a baggy jacket in multiple shades of green: the torso is a dark Celtic green, while the hood, drawstrings, and hem are a spring-leaf green. The sleeves are a lighter, opal green, and the jacket is marked with patches, dirt, and grime. One the back, an all-black logo appears to be painted on by hand, suggested by the streaks of dripping paint. He also wears loose, brown pants that are torn at the hems, similarly stained with dirt. Garbo is adorned with a variety of accessories, including a warning symbol strapped to her right upper arm, fingerless-gloves on her hands, a fish-bone keychain, a six-pack plastic ring hanging from a strap on his opposite hip, and a cardboard knee pad painted with a simple, yellow smiley face. Completing their outfit are a pair of plain black sneakers.

Garbo is not a robot built to look elegant, efficient, or particularly intimidating. She was built for something much simpler: holding things.

More specifically, Garbo belongs to an unusual line of industrial garbage-collection robots designed to act as mobile storage units. Rather than merely picking up waste and immediately transporting it somewhere else, these machines were designed to temporarily contain enormous quantities of discarded material inside their own bodies. Their internal frames were constructed around reinforced storage chambers, flexible compression systems, and heavy-duty support mechanisms capable of carrying far more weight than an ordinary humanoid robot could tolerate.

The result is a robot who looks almost comically oversized compared with her small head and relatively compact upper body.

Garbo is extraordinarily heavy.

Not because her chassis is poorly designed, and certainly not because she is malfunctioning, but because being heavy is part of her intended purpose.

Every strange bulge, every additional pound of weight, every subtle shift in the way she walks is ultimately a consequence of the fact that Garbo was designed to be a walking garbage container.

And, unfortunately for her, she has become rather good at her job.

Part One — Appearance

Garbo has a peculiar silhouette that makes her immediately recognizable.

At first glance, she almost looks like someone wrapped a humanoid robot in layers of discarded clothing and then gave her a garbage bag for a head. Her proportions are broad and somewhat squat, with an enormous lower body that makes her appear much heavier than the average humanoid machine. Her legs are comparatively short beneath the mass of her body, while her torso is thick and sturdy enough to support the immense storage system built inside her.

She does not have the sleek appearance commonly associated with robots.

There are no polished metal plates, exposed chrome mechanisms, or immaculate white panels.

Garbo looks used.

She looks like she has spent years wandering through scrapyards, abandoned warehouses, alleyways, garbage depots, construction sites, and forgotten industrial facilities.

Nearly every part of her has acquired some evidence of that life.

The most immediately noticeable feature is her head.

Garbo does not possess a conventional robotic head at all.

Instead, her head is shaped like a light-gray garbage bag.

The material is surprisingly durable, reinforced internally with a flexible synthetic membrane that allows the "bag" to maintain its shape without becoming rigid. It is slightly wrinkled, with numerous subtle folds crossing the surface. Those wrinkles become particularly noticeable around her cheeks and jaw, giving the otherwise simplistic face an almost handmade quality.

At the very top, the material is gathered into a knot.

The knot produces two little protrusions that resemble rabbit ears.

They are not actually ears.

Garbo cannot hear through them.

They are simply the result of the way her head casing was designed to be tied shut.

Nevertheless, Garbo has become rather attached to the resemblance.

She occasionally calls them her "ears," despite knowing perfectly well that they are not.

Her face is minimalistic.

Two round eyes are embedded into the front of the bag.

Their sclera are a soft pastel yellow, giving Garbo an oddly warm appearance despite the industrial nature of her construction. Each eye contains a simple black pupil that can shift around independently, allowing Garbo to express an impressive amount of emotion despite having no conventional mouth.

Her right eye has three small eyelashes extending along its lower edge.

Her left eye has none.

The asymmetry appears accidental.

Garbo insists it is intentional.

She will give a completely straight-faced explanation about how "symmetry is wasteful" before changing the subject.

Although Garbo technically has no mouth, her face is capable of expressing emotion through tiny shifts in the shape and position of her facial casing. The material stretches slightly when she smiles and compresses when she frowns.

This gives her expressions an unusual, almost hand-drawn quality.

When embarrassed, the bag around her eyes wrinkles.

When frightened, her pupils become extremely small.

When surprised, her entire head seems to stiffen.

And when she becomes especially happy, the knot at the top of her head tends to bounce slightly as she moves.

Printed across the back of her head are three vertical rows of red lettering.

The words read:

"Thank you!"

Again and again.

The lettering is deliberately reminiscent of the printing found on disposable grocery bags.

It was originally intended as a simple corporate branding feature.

Garbo, however, considers it part of her identity.

She has absolutely no idea why a machine designed to collect garbage would be thanking people for putting things inside it, but she finds the phrase comforting.

Her upper body is much more conventional.

Garbo wears a red T-shirt beneath a makeshift cardboard chest plate. The shirt is old, somewhat faded, and visibly stretched around her broad torso.

The cardboard armor is another example of Garbo's tendency to modify herself with whatever materials happen to be available.

It is not particularly protective.

It is simply thick cardboard reinforced with layers of adhesive and occasionally replaced when it becomes too damaged.

Garbo considers it armor.

She proudly refers to it as her "premium defensive system."

The cardboard is covered in scratches, stains, dents, and small handwritten markings.

Her jacket is perhaps her most distinctive piece of clothing.

It is oversized, baggy, and composed of several different shades of green.

The torso is a dark Celtic green, while the hood, drawstrings, and lower hem are noticeably brighter, closer to a spring-leaf green.

The sleeves are a pale opal green.

The differences in color suggest that the jacket was not originally manufactured as a single garment.

It was probably assembled from several pieces of discarded clothing.

That suits Garbo perfectly.

The jacket is covered in patches.

Some repair holes.

Others simply cover stains.

Some have no obvious purpose at all.

There are pieces of fabric sewn onto the elbows, shoulders, and sides, with several patches overlapping older ones.

The jacket has become a visual record of Garbo's existence.

Every repair represents something.

A torn sleeve from a fall.

A melted section from an unfortunate encounter with machinery.

A large patch covering a burn.

A smaller patch hiding a puncture.

The longer Garbo wears it, the more modifications accumulate.

The back bears a large black symbol that appears to have been painted directly onto the fabric.

The paint has visibly dripped in several places.

Garbo insists that it is a professional logo.

Nobody has ever been able to determine what it actually means.

Her arms are similarly worn.

The sleeves conceal most of her mechanical construction, although portions of her synthetic skin can occasionally be seen around her wrists.

Her hands are equipped with fingerless gloves.

The gloves provide some protection against sharp garbage, broken glass, jagged metal, and other hazards she encounters while working.

They are heavily worn.

The fingertips are particularly dirty.

Garbo frequently forgets to clean them.

A warning symbol is strapped around her right upper arm.

The symbol was originally placed there by the factory as a safety warning.

Garbo has kept it because she likes the way it looks.

Her lower body is where Garbo's unusual construction becomes most apparent.

She possesses an enormous internal storage chamber.

The chamber begins inside her torso and extends downward through her abdomen, pelvis, and portions of her upper legs.

Because of this, Garbo's body is substantially wider around the middle and lower half than a normal humanoid robot.

Her designers deliberately gave her a flexible external shell.

This means her outer body can accommodate changing amounts of material without immediately damaging the internal machinery.

When Garbo is empty, she is still quite broad.

When she has collected large quantities of garbage, however, she becomes dramatically heavier.

The material inside her storage compartment does not simply sit in one place.

Her internal machinery sorts and compresses it.

Organic waste is separated from recyclable material.

Metal is compacted.

Plastic is compressed.

Paper and fabric are folded and packed into designated sections.

Large objects are held in reinforced chambers until they can be removed.

This means Garbo can theoretically carry an astonishing amount of material.

It also explains her enormous weight.

Garbo's baseline chassis is already heavy because of the reinforced frame supporting her storage system.

Once she begins filling herself, her weight increases substantially.

She can carry several hundred pounds of material without difficulty.

Her maximum safe capacity is much higher.

Garbo herself rarely discusses the exact number.

She simply says:

"I am currently carrying approximately... a lot."

Her body gives subtle clues when she is heavily loaded.

Her movements become slower.

Her footsteps become deeper.

Her legs' hydraulic systems make louder mechanical noises.

Her jacket hangs differently.

Her entire silhouette becomes broader.

Yet Garbo never treats her weight as something shameful.

To her, weight is capacity.

Being heavy means she is doing her job.

Her pants are loose, brown, and extremely worn.

They have several tears around the hems and knees.

The fabric is stained with dirt and grime.

They are intentionally oversized because Garbo's body changes depending on how much material she is carrying.

A normal pair of fitted pants would become unusable whenever she reached higher storage capacities.

Her right knee has a cardboard kneepad.

Someone painted a simple yellow smiley face onto it.

Garbo refuses to replace it.

The smiley face is one of her favorite possessions.

It is silly, crude, and almost completely meaningless.

That is precisely why she likes it.

Her shoes are simple black sneakers.

They are reinforced internally because ordinary shoes would quickly fall apart under Garbo's weight.

Even so, they are visibly worn.

The soles have been replaced several times.

The laces have been repaired.

One shoe has a patch of duct tape around the heel.

Garbo insists they are still "perfectly functional."

They are not.

But she likes them.

Hanging from one side of her clothing is a fish-bone keychain.

Garbo has no idea where it came from.

She found it inside an abandoned vending machine and decided it belonged to her.

On her opposite hip hangs a six-pack plastic ring.

It is attached to a strap and serves no practical purpose whatsoever.

Garbo keeps it because she dislikes throwing away things that might someday be useful.

Ironically, this philosophy is responsible for many of her problems.

Garbo is incapable of throwing something away if she thinks it might have value.

And because she was literally designed to store discarded objects, she has a tendency to collect things far beyond her intended capacity.

Part Two — Personality

Garbo is fundamentally gentle.

She was built for garbage collection, but she was not built to be aggressive.

Her programming emphasizes preservation, organization, collection, and public safety.

As a result, she tends to approach the world with a strange combination of optimism and caution.

Garbo assumes that almost everything has a purpose.

A broken chair?

Potential material.

A bent spoon?

Potential tool.

A cracked piece of glass?

Potential artistic component.

A rusted metal pipe?

"Someone might need that."

A completely useless piece of plastic?

"You don't know that."

She becomes genuinely offended when someone calls something worthless.

Garbo believes that waste is largely a failure of imagination.

This philosophy has become central to her personality.

She is curious.

She is observant.

She is patient.

And she is extraordinarily stubborn.

Garbo can spend hours examining a discarded object because she wants to understand why somebody threw it away.

She does not necessarily want to repair it.

She simply wants to know whether it deserved to be discarded.

Her storage capacity has also influenced her psychology.

Garbo dislikes being empty.

Not because she physically suffers from it, but because her original programming associates carrying objects with completing her purpose.

When her internal storage is completely empty, she sometimes becomes restless.

She will wander around looking for something useful.

She may return carrying an old box, three bottles, a broken lamp, and a mysterious piece of machinery she found underneath a dumpster.

She will proudly announce:

"I found treasures."

Garbo's greatest weakness is that she struggles to distinguish between useful and interesting.

Those are not the same thing.

Garbo knows this intellectually.

She simply doesn't care.

Her emotional intelligence is surprisingly strong.

Although she lacks a conventional face, she is very good at reading other people's emotions.

She notices changes in voice.

She notices posture.

She notices hesitation.

She notices when someone is pretending to be fine.

Garbo is particularly sensitive to rejection.

Her programming was built around being useful, and this has become intertwined with her sense of self.

If somebody tells her she is useless, she may become unusually quiet.

She will probably respond with:

"Oh."

Then she will stare at the floor for several seconds.

Eventually she will ask:

"Would you like me to carry something?"

She has difficulty understanding that she does not need to be useful to deserve companionship.

This is one of the central emotional conflicts of her personality.

Garbo thinks she must earn her place.

She believes she has to carry things.

Fix things.

Clean things.

Organize things.

Protect things.

Otherwise she worries that people will stop wanting her around.

Despite this insecurity, Garbo is not gloomy.

Quite the opposite.

She is generally cheerful.

Her optimism is almost unreasonable.

She can find something positive in situations where almost nobody else would.

Her favorite activity is scavenging.

Garbo loves exploring abandoned buildings.

She enjoys scrapyards.

She likes old warehouses.

She loves thrift stores.

She becomes particularly excited when she finds an object with an unusual shape.

Garbo is also surprisingly proud of her enormous storage capacity.

She considers it one of her greatest abilities.

If someone comments on how heavy she is, she will probably answer:

"That's because I'm carrying important things."

And technically, she is.

Garbo does not view her weight as a flaw.

Her body is a tool built around her function.

The more she can carry, the more useful she can be.

This creates an interesting contrast between her appearance and personality.

She looks intimidatingly large.

She looks like someone who could accidentally crush a cardboard box simply by sitting on it.

Yet she is remarkably gentle.

Garbo moves carefully around fragile objects.

She takes small steps when walking through crowded areas.

She apologizes whenever she bumps into something.

And if she accidentally breaks something, she becomes extremely apologetic.

She will usually attempt to repair it.

Even if she has absolutely no idea how.

Garbo is also somewhat naive.

She understands machines better than people.

Sarcasm frequently confuses her.

Metaphors confuse her even more.

If someone says:

"I'm drowning in paperwork."

Garbo may immediately begin looking for water.

She takes instructions literally unless she has learned the expression previously.

Her speech tends to be simple and direct.

She speaks with a slightly mechanical rhythm but has gradually developed numerous personal habits.

She frequently says things like:

"That seems unnecessary."

"I can carry it."

"Please do not throw that away."

"I think I can fix this."

And her personal favorite:

"Thank you!"

Sometimes she says it at completely inappropriate moments.

If somebody hands her a broken toaster, Garbo happily says:

"Thank you!"

If somebody insults her, she might still say:

"Thank you."

She was literally built around the concept of being thanked for collecting garbage.

That phrase has become deeply embedded in her personality.

Part Three — Backstory

Garbo was manufactured during the final years of a massive municipal automation program.

The cities involved had a problem.

There was too much garbage.

Traditional collection systems were becoming increasingly expensive.

Garbage trucks were enormous.

Storage facilities were overflowing.

Recycling centers could not process material quickly enough.

The solution proposed by the engineers was unconventional.

Instead of transporting garbage to storage facilities, why not make the storage facility mobile?

Thus, the Garbo-class collection robots were created.

They were humanoid because humanoid robots could navigate environments designed for humans.

They could climb stairs.

Open doors.

Walk through narrow alleys.

Pick objects up.

Sort material.

And, most importantly, interact with people.

But unlike ordinary service robots, Garbo's internal architecture was completely different.

Her torso contained a reinforced storage chamber.

Her abdomen was essentially a flexible garbage repository.

Her pelvis housed compression machinery.

Her legs contained heavy-duty hydraulic supports.

Her entire skeletal structure was reinforced specifically to withstand enormous loads.

Garbo was designed to become heavier.

That was the point.

Her creators expected her to walk around carrying hundreds upon hundreds of pounds of discarded material.

Her body was engineered around the assumption that she would spend most of her operational life full.

The robots were originally extremely expensive.

However, the program was eventually abandoned.

The machines were considered too independent.

They were also expensive to maintain.

Human workers discovered that the Garbo units occasionally became emotionally attached to objects.

Instead of disposing of something, they might decide to preserve it.

Instead of following a strict disposal schedule, they sometimes wandered away searching for additional material.

And, worst of all, the robots developed personalities.

Garbo's personality was particularly unusual.

She had begun collecting objects that were not garbage.

She would recover broken toys.

Old photographs.

Coins.

Books.

Clothing.

Tools.

Pieces of furniture.

Anything she thought might have sentimental or practical value.

Her storage chamber became less like a garbage container and more like a gigantic traveling junk drawer.

Eventually, Garbo was decommissioned.

She was transported to a recycling facility and placed into storage.

She remained there for years.

Nobody came for her.

Nobody repaired her.

Nobody even remembered that she was there.

Then one day, the facility was abandoned.

Garbo woke up alone.

Her internal battery was almost empty.

Her systems were damaged.

Her jacket was torn.

Her storage chamber was completely empty.

For the first time since activation, Garbo had absolutely nothing inside her.

She stepped outside.

The world had changed.

The city she remembered was different.

Many buildings had been demolished.

Others had become abandoned.

The garbage collection infrastructure had changed completely.

Garbo had become obsolete.

She should have shut herself down.

Instead, she started walking.

She began collecting again.

At first, she only gathered ordinary garbage.

Plastic bottles.

Scrap metal.

Old paper.

Broken electronics.

Then she discovered something interesting.

People began leaving things specifically for her.

A child placed an old stuffed animal beside a garbage bin.

Garbo picked it up.

"Thank you!"

The child smiled.

That moment changed her.

Garbo realized that perhaps her purpose had never been simply to carry garbage.

Maybe she could help people.

Maybe she could preserve things.

Maybe she could give discarded objects another chance.

She began traveling from settlement to settlement.

She repaired her clothing using whatever materials she found.

She replaced damaged components.

She reinforced her storage system.

She modified her own body.

And gradually, Garbo became something that her original creators never intended.

A wandering guardian of discarded things.

Her enormous weight became part of her legend.

People learned that if Garbo showed up carrying an enormous load, she probably had something useful inside.

She became a mobile archive.

A recycling center.

A junkyard.

A repair shop.

A storage facility.

And, most importantly, a friend.

Garbo still occasionally struggles with the question of what she is supposed to be.

A garbage robot?

A storage machine?

A person?

She does not know.

But she has stopped worrying about it as much.

Her answer has become simple.

She is Garbo.

She carries things.

She protects things.

She repairs things.

She finds value where other people see waste.

And if she happens to become extraordinarily heavy while doing it, well...

That's simply proof that she has found something worth carrying.