While it’s certainly possible to look at “Fight the Future” in isolation, it’s also possible to take the elements of the mythology, developed over time, and re-cast them into a single, self-consistent “big picture”. This comprehensive mythology requires a framework that is only suggested by the series itself, but it also resolves certain inconsistencies created by the piecemeal progress of the franchise.
In particular, this version of the mythology considers the spiritual elements of the series to be the central core of the entire concept. While many episodes deal with more material concerns, enough episodes hint at a much deeper level of spiritual warfare behind it all. Thus this version of the mythology considers the focus on certain characters and their histories as pertaining strongly to that spiritual core. The conspiracies and “aliens” are a by-product of the larger psychological and spiritual drama.
Purity is the primarily unseen villain, a malevolent collective of non-corporeal intelligences, effectively the pure energy version of “evil” itself. Purity wants to take dominion over all life, to replace collective diversity and communion with the cold sameness of entropy. In balance with Purity is the benevolent equal but opposite spiritual collective. Together these forces represent the constant struggle between “light” and “darkness”, or in religious terms, the struggle between “God” (non-corporeal) and angels (incarnations), “Satan” (non-corporeal) and demons (incarnations).
These forces have determined that humanity represents a unique opportunity. The species has the latent potential to evolve into a non-corporeal collective, one that could ultimately shape the evolution of the universe (as hinted in “Two Fathers”). This is the result of manipulation on both sides of the conflict. Purity itself desires a source of physical manifestation, a means of incarnating that will result in a rapid expansion within the material world. The opposing spiritual forces seek to counter that by “seeding” the human race with the potential to become its own self-directing collective, adding specific latent genetic material that can be made active at the right time. These “activated” individuals would then become “sentinels” with psychic abilities that allow them to operate on the same playing field as non-corporeal entities.
In the years just before “Colonization” in 2012, three forces emerge to determine the fate of humanity. Purity fosters, through deception, a vast international conspiracy to develop and control the means of artificially evolving humanity to provide the perfect host bodies for physical manifestation. Another group, the so-called “Rebels”, knows the truth about Purity and seeks to use the products of the conspiracy to control the destiny of the human race themselves. The third group is the one led by William, Mulder and Scully’s son, the product of the latent genetic engineering that will allow humanity to evolve more naturally into an enlightened collective, along with the “sentinels”.
Purity controls the conspiracy through the convenient lie that Colonization can be survived through collaboration, and that this Colonization is an “alien invasion”. The true plan is far more complex. Purity can only take physical form through the creation of a host species, something that only humanity can provide to achieve the goal of co-opting a latently powerful species. That is “scheduled” to take place in 2012, as a result of the conspiracy that began with the Roswell incident in 1947.
The Roswell incident involved a craft designed and used by the Rebels. The Rebels were obsessed with the perfect genetic code, the one that expresses the ultimate potential of humanity. The Rebels are led by a “rogue sentinel”, a man aware of the latent genetic potential “seeded” into the human genome by the spiritual forced opposing Purity. That genetic code is imprinted on their technology, and when the wreckage at Roswell was recovered, a select few gained access to the information inscribed on its surfaces. Cancer Man, in particular, discovered that the genetic code imprinted on the wreckage was part of a “prophecy” (in reality, future history) regarding the human being that would be able to bring humanity together to defeat Purity.
Purity itself, in a contained sample of the “black oil”, was on the Rebel craft recovered at Roswell. Under the guise of Project: Paper Clip, Cancer Man and Bill Mulder worked with the early conspiracy to find ways to artificially alter the human genome, to create “super soldiers” that could resist the “black oil” and therefore prevent the spread of Purity. A genetic catalogue was developed and maintained to find the humans with the latent genetic potential that might potentially match what was on the craft found at Roswell, thus representing the most likely source of a natural resistance.
At the same time, unknown to Bill Mulder, Cancer Man determined that his own genome matched many elements of the genetic code inscribed on the Roswell craft. Obsessed with the idea of secretly fathering the key to humanity’s salvation, Cancer Man used the genetic catalogue to find a woman on the “inventory list” that might provide the remaining genetic material. One of those women was Teena Mulder.
Also recovered with the craft at Roswell were clones of modified human beings: shape-shifters. The modifications involved a dual circulatory system: the usual red blood and a second system using retroviral elements to control biology on a cellular level. The retrovirus was found to be a kind of organic nanotechnology. However, it was not completely adaptive, since it was paired with normal human biology. The clones understood how to clone themselves to multiply, but they could not provide the technology necessary to modify normal humans to result in their own biological forms.
There was also self-repair technology within the craft itself. The technology was a kind of nanotechnology of its own, able to take the basic components of available matter and use them to reconstruct whatever they were programmed to maintain. The nanocytes, as they would come to be called, were directed through the use of programmed “control chips”.
The conspiracy was born out of the understanding (or more correctly, the belief) that Roswell was the beginning of a planned alien invasion. Cancer Man and Bill Mulder knew the truth, and kept it to themselves. Cancer Man knew more than anyone, and carefully manipulated the Syndicate to his own advantage as the years passed by. Cancer Man understood that the recovered craft was the result of technological advancement, and became convinced that he sent the craft back himself to ensure that he would have the information to bring about humanity’s salvation. Bill Mulder, on the other hand, wanted to get a sample of the black oil and find a way to “vaccinate” the human race against it.
Cancer Man used his personal knowledge of the “foretold” genetic code to identify Teena, and he seduced her, producing two children. Cancer Man used that betrayal to break Bill Mulder, taking firm control of the direction that the conspiracy would take. By 1973, when the elements of the conspiracy from a point in the future began sending back representatives to ensure that the Syndicate continued on the necessary path (as seen in “Two Fathers” and “One Son”), Cancer Man’s suspicions were apparently confirmed.
By 1973, work had begun in earnest to alter or clone humans with the organic nanotech discovered within the recovered clones from the Roswell crash. But none of the work was successful. The conspiracy was directed to attempt certain experiments. One part of the Project would work on refining the self-repair and control chip nanotechnology. Another part of the Project would attempt to find a means of altering the human genome so that the organic nanotechnology of the Roswell clones would ultimately result from natural human reproduction. The final phase of the Project would involve a delivery system, a means of spreading the viral form of Purity quickly and efficiently to the human population.
Purity’s goal was therefore expressed in a three phase plan. “Phase I” would be the creation of control implants that would release nanotechnology into selected human subjects. Those humans would then become the desired super-soldiers of the conspiracy, the advance teams that would infiltrate the human populace and authority centers. This would allow the conspiracy to take over world governments, aiding in the methodical spread of the implant technology.
“Phase II” involved reproductive experiments aimed at altering existing human embryos, obtained through cloning or the abduction process by which the test subjects for the technology in “Phase I” were obtained. The cloned embryos were used to create more of the same clones recovered at Roswell (as seen in “Momento Mori”), or to attempt creation of organic “super soldiers” analogous to the Roswell clones. The “test tube” clones involved the family members of the Syndicate, including Samantha, resulting in “drones” that performed specific tasks as commanded but had no independent intelligence. The final goal of “Phase II” was to determine a means of introducing something into the human populace that would result in “natural” reproduction of drones. Within a generation after “Phase I” was completed, the human race would end and a race perfectly suited for “possession” by Purity would be waiting in the wings.
“Phase III” would be the final moment of “Colonization”. The remaining humans would be infected by the viral form of Purity, and those infected humans would immediately gestate “possessed” host bodies identical to those “naturally” created as drones in “Phase II”. This final phase would involve the most damning deception of all: the viral form of Purity is, in fact, a creation of the Syndicate.
Bill Mulder pushed for the Syndicate to create a “vaccine” against Purity. However, Purity is a perfectly adaptive viral agent, the physical manifestation of a non-corporeal intelligence able to alter and control matter and energy on the most minute scale. A vaccine against such a viral agent would require an equally adaptive agent to counter the black oil’s effect. As a result, when the Russians create the vaccine to the black oil, they actually create the building blocks for the very thing they seek to destroy. The only difference is that the adaptive viral agent is “possessed” by the intelligence that is Purity when it becomes the “black oil”.
The series takes place in the years after “Phase I” is completed (as explained in the final season) and “Phase II” is being driven to its inevitable conclusion (the reproductive experiments seen in “Per Manum”, for instance). The future elements of the conspiracy continue to intervene, posing as “alien Colonists”, to ensure their own creation. The Rebels, on the other hand, are an offshoot of the “Phase II” experiments. In the process of the experiments, someone determined a means of creating the organic “super soldiers” while retaining actual human intelligence. The Rebels, then, seek to foster the conspiracy to the end of “Phase II”, at which point the goal is to derail “Phase III” and take control.
The Roswell crash itself was a deliberate act on the part of the Rebels. The Rebels already knew how Purity would take advantage of the conspiracy that was spawned by the Roswell incident; at the same time, they understood that the conspiracy was necessary to their own goal of artificial human evolution. Thus the Rebels often act to preserve some elements of the conspiracy while undermining and dismantling others, a process that is most evident in “One Son”.
Caught in the balance is Fox Mulder. Mulder is protected by his true father, Cancer Man, because he might be the “foretold” savior of mankind. At the same time, Mulder is also aided by the benevolent spiritual intelligences opposed to Purity, who have manipulated the human genome to ensure that Mulder and Scully will birth the actual savior: William. In fact, those same forces take action to protect and guide Mulder, Scully, and their chosen allies towards that end. The series depicts the years during which those individuals were working on the X-Files, and how the complexities of this spiritual struggle unfolded.
“Fight the Future” is therefore an important step in this process. As seen on the series, Cancer Man has a far more complex agenda than the rest of the Syndicate might believe. He was the one who engineered the end of Mulder’s work on the X-Files in the fifth season finale, “The End”, thus placing Mulder and Scully in the position they are in at the beginning of the film. More to the point, he is the only one who knows the truth about Purity. Much of what happens in the film doesn’t make sense unless Cancer Man’s goal of manipulating the Syndicate is taken into consideration (something a new viewer simply wouldn’t have enough information to discern).
