Mother moves among her children, making sure everybody gets a share and everybody plays nice. Or at least, what passes for nice among these people. No biting. Any gouged eyeballs must be handed back. She reassures them without looking like she's doing it, each in the way she knows works best for them. Cruel jokes, ridiculous threats and shared laughter, a punch in the arm, a pat on the rear, a kiss, a cuff in the back of the head, or even quiet discussion for those who need it. She knows these people and there's a definite familial pattern to how she interacts with them, even if it's a severely disfunctional family.<br/><br/>From Amanuel's perspective, the wedge is a poor choice when it comes to applying lubricant to a straining, cobbled-together system, and it's ruthless when it comes to regulating that system as it approaches the point of shaking itself apart...But it has maintained with little wear thus far, and the chaotic-seeming system has accreted around it with allowances made for the nature of its destructive internal regulator.<br/><br/>She had twitched slightly when Amanuel had laughed at her, but then he'd called her an angel, and Rez didn't even know where to begin with that. She knew what angels were. Both kinds. And she didn't have wings (though some of her cohort wore black feathers on high frames that ruffled and snapped in the wind of their passage (http://thumbs.dreamstime.com/z/polish-winged-hussar-15295340.jpg)), and (having never been consecrated by one of his priests) she wasn't one of the devout followers of the great god Barger (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonny_Barger). She wasn't sure what the exchange had meant, but she was sure the madman didn't mean the laugh as an insult. And what if he had, what then? He kept the hogs rolling and greased, and they were being paid to take him out here and to bring him back. And there'd been too much woofing already. Last thing she needed was for more fuss to get kicked up. So she'd chosen to take it as flattery and let him go with an underhanded pat. First time she'd seen the man showing large, and large was definitely the word for it. If she'd thought for a minute it was for her instead of the hunk of armor on wheels, she might've tumbled him.<br/><br/>Or not. Blood and asphalt, she was tired.<br/><br/>Seemingly random oscillations through the warband's Brownian motion eventually bring her to a position within earshot of Ogre and Buttercup, well after the last of the clowns has expired. Vaporub's in the back of one of the vans, rather too busy dipping his wick, but anything Rez says in these moments of downtime tends to find its way to whom it may concern.<br/><br/>"F'what it's worth, I'd have'is guts for garters." She isn't looking at or addressing anybody specific, but she's definitely looking back towards the Hold...Back the way Warner staggered off into the tall grass. "Alive he's a lot more trouble'n dead."<br/><br/>She idly toes a dead clown's hand with her boot, then glances about for a moment to see if she can work out which clown it belonged to. "But...I ain't never seen nothin' so shiny as his kit. M'curious t'see if he c'n dig up more where he found this." She twitches her head back towards the looming bulk of the M-ATV, ponytail swaying a moment in the breezeless heat.<br/><br/>"If that don't happen, well." There's no humor at all in her grin. "Then he's yours an' I'll hold'm down while y'do th'cutting. Right?"<br/><br/>She wheels, raising her voice without waiting for response, these bellows of a far less private or directed nature. "Awright y'fuckers! We were contracted t'bring back four trucks'n keep 'Manuel safe. We got eight...Or seven an'whatever that fuck'n thing is!" She waves an arm at the M-ATV.<br/><br/>"Job well done. Y'make yer momma proud."<br/><br/>She points at one of the original trucks. "There's three barrels n'back a-that one. Y'can open exactly one. If it's drinkable, knock y'rselves out, but remember we gotta get this crap back t'Marco's place an' get paid. An' I'm bettin' we can do some fine partyin' on the bonuses we got t'day. So get it on now, but be ready t'move your asses before th'sun's halfway down th'sky. Y'wanna save some energy f'r the whores at th'Hold, an' y'don't wanna bend yer forks gettin' there."<br/><br/>Mama has no patience for those who aren't ready to ride when it's time to move out. They know this.<br/><br/>She swaggers over to the place the first clown truck had been stopped (by now dragged aside by Amanuel's strange mechanical perturbations) and reaches down to liberate the black-feathered spear from the remains of the first clown to die, then makes her way to the tallest rise in the immediate vicinity. Wordless, she plants the spear there to quiver against the skyline, before she strolls back towards her own bike. The Hammer's bike.<br/><br/>As Rez stretches out on her back atop the old Harley, by ones and twos<em>los Buitres</em>begin dragging clowns and chunks of clowns over to the spear, making a pile. Every so often someone pulls the black-plumed pike to wedge it back once more atop the crest of the small hill they're building. This is part of their voodoo. Little rituals that comfort the little family...And terrify everyone else. The spear and the corpse-pile will stay when motorcycle gang leaves, but some of the corpses will be missing heads...and not a one will have a heart. In this neighborhood, anyone who finds it will know full well what it means and whose work it is.<br/><br/>And the Vulture Queen? She has her own rituals. Rez rolls onto the bike's saddle backwards, then flops back with her head between the handlebars, her long, Manchu-style queue dangling almost to the ground between the supporting faces of two cracked dials that once had meaning, back when speeds were measured in values other than 'fast enough' and degrees of engine heat mattered besides 'not hot enough to burn your legs through your leathers'.<br/><br/>The broad fuel tank burns hotly against her shoulderblades, radiating the sun's heat upward into her body. She crosses her long, booted legs, propping them up against the tall pillion-backrest with its mounted skulls and feathers, and stares straight up into the sun, shifting a bit and raising her hands to slide her goggles up onto her forehead. Cracked yellow eyes reflect the pitiless burning monster in the sky without flinching. Rez feels her head begin to ache as she stares and waits for the bloody-hued colors to come.<br/><br/>The Vultures move more carefully around her now, leaving a somewhat quiet space in which she gazes unblinking into the blinding light.<br/><br/>Rez stares into the sun until all she can see is burning fury. She bares her teeth, thinking about the enormous bulk of the unnaturally preserved armored vehicle behind her, its metal ticking slowly as its engine cools and Amanuel does...whatever Amanuel does when presented with such gifts. She thinks about the man she has made a pedestrian. And she thinks about Marco and the best way to get rid of her dangerously valuable prize.<br/><br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">Open Your Braaaaaaaaaaaaain</div><div class="spoiler_body">And Rez rolls a 7, bare minimum to succeed. (https://elliquiy.com/forums/dicebot.php?r=56828)</div></div>