Summary
“Forever Be the Shining Truth” provides most of the information that viewers need to put the mystery of Run Away together, not that they’ll necessarily be able to tell at this point.
The previous episode of Harlan Coben’s Run Away revealed that Dee Dee was connected to a religious cult called the Beacon of the Shining Truth, and this makes figuring the plot out a lot easier. Cults are always in the wrong. Their leaders are always bad guys. Episode 5 isn’t too open about what’s going on, but it shows us enough that anyone with a decent sense of things can figure out what’s what.
In fact, I’d even go so far as to claim that after “Forever Be the Shining Truth”, you can basically figure out everything. There are some late twists that might surprise you – patience, Padawan, we’ll get there – but the broad strokes are all ready to be put together.
The Beacon of the Shining Truth
An opening flashback clarifies that Dee Dee got the kill list that she and Ash are working through from the Shining Truth, the religious cult that “saved” her after all the trauma she endured in the foster system, which she put to bed – and into the ground – by killing and burying Mrs. O’Hara.
In the present day, the cult wants to “thank” Ash for doing their dirty work, which means an in-person visit and some crucial exposition about what the place is up to. In the simplest possible terms, the place is presided over by a guy named Caspar Vartage, otherwise known as “The One”. He has two sons, “The Visitor” and “The Volunteer”, which probably aren’t going to top the list of popular baby names any time soon. Ash and Dee Dee are ostensibly there to provide a woman, whose name is Mother Adiona, with an update on the mission, but Dee Dee wants to participate in some sort of ceremony while they’re there. Ash, already sceptical, doesn’t like the fact that he can hear women screaming during said ceremony and lunges at Adiona, but a giant security guard knocks him out.
When he wakes up, he and Dee Dee are taken before the One, who gives them more people to kill, keys to a new car, and the location of a buried cache of weapons. But we later see that Adiona slipped Ash a note telling him not to kill the targets and not to trust Dee Dee. So, things are getting a little complicated with these two.
Everything Is Connecting
Despite being arrested, Elena tells Alex to look into Kevin Gano. She also tells Lou, who comes to pick her up from the station, that she knows about Maria and Daisy, and thus knows that she also knew, but Lou claims not to have known while Joel was alive. Frankly, I believe her. But Elena isn’t having it. Luckily, she has the case to distract her from her personal life.
So, here’s what we know. The Discovered Ancestry DNA site is the most pertinent link, since Henry was also looking it up. Damien and Henry were both adopted through the same agency, and now that it has come out that Ingrid – who’s in surgery but alive – might have been having a long-term affair with Jay, Simon thinks that Paige might not be his daughter. Given that Professor van de Beek ran the Family Tree Club, Simon thinks he might have been helping her trace her own heritage.
There’s something in this, since when Simon goes through Paige’s banking history, he sees a payment to a website called Absolute Ancestry. Having apparently seen enough, he calls Jessica for an off-the-books paternity test.
The Connection Between Isaac and Cornelius
With Cornelius still looking like a suspect, Isaac finally reveals to Ruby what the connection between the two of them is. They used to be neighbours. His son, Grayson, was Isaac’s best friend. However, when Cornelius’s wife died of a brain aneurysm, he and the kids moved away.
Isaac goes to see Cornelius. Grayson is now dead, having drunk himself to death after his mother passed. In so many words, Cornelius confesses to shooting Luther and defends Simon. He has a history of small-scale vigilantism – in 2019, he was arrested for taking a baseball bat to a man who was abusing his son – but Isaac knows his character and believes what he says.
This isn’t enough for Ruby, though, who wants to charge him with shooting Luther. Isaac clears him without her knowledge, though. It’s a big step, since he’s not only going behind Ruby’s back, but he might be wrong. A scene at the end of Run Away Episode 5 shows Cornelius dumping the knife that seems to have been used to kill Aaron.
Simon’s Dead Ends
After collecting the things he needs for the DNA test and handing them off to Jessica, Simon turns to Sam and Anya for help in figuring out where Professor van de Beek might be. He also gets a sudden message from Katie, asking him to meet her so she can “explain everything”.
But Katie explains nothing, really. She claims that she and Paige fell out because she was trying to warn her off van de Beek, but she claims not to know anything about the Family Tree Club, about Paige’s apparent problems at home, and she has never heard of Jay. It’s quite obvious to the audience that she’s running interference to protect van de Beek, since her email never got through.
At a dead end, Simon goes to confront Jay at the hospital, who, rather smugly, tells him that there’s a lot he doesn’t know about his wife.
Elena’s New Lead
Elena is having much more luck in “Forever Be the Shining Truth”. She heads to the adoption agency and speaks to a particularly unhelpful man named Maish, but she’s smart enough to leave an errant AirPod in his dish of sweets. From the phone call that Maish makes the second she leaves the office, she’s able to turn up the name Alison, and somehow – through the key tones, I guess – figure out her phone number.
Elena goes to see Alison at her business, who confirms that Aaron was also adopted. All of the victims thus far were her cases. She claims to have saved all of them from a bad situation, and it must be pretty bad indeed, since when Elena mentions Paige’s name, Alison does a runner. Elena gives chase, kneeing her assistant in the crotch on her way out.
While all this is going on, Elena is also screening Lou’s calls. Since Lou is with Maria, there might be a bit more news in her personal life that she needs to hear.
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