Fix error handling

What does this MR do?

Closes #43 (closed)

This ports some of the code from !46 (closed)

There are two things swallowing error codes:

• Using export FOO=$(script) hides exit codes from script. See https://github.com/koalaman/shellcheck/wiki/SC2155 for a more detailed explanation.
• Using make which does not support -o pipefail and a pipe in the failing command.

This is causing VM provisioning issues to not fail the CI job. See line 60 here https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/ci-cd/shared-runners/images/macstadium/orka/-/jobs/892595223#L60

Why was this MR needed?

What's the best way to test this MR?

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