The Creative Chronicles of Dave Stancliff

It doesn’t matter when it started, but if you hold me to it, my new mission in life began after I got out of the Army’s Special Forces two years ago.

My name is John Sill and I’m still able to kill after 25 years of devoted service to my country. If there’s one thing that makes my blood boil it’s traitors. Let me be clear for you civilian types; if someone does anything to harm my country their life is forfeit.

When I found out that some ex-military members were organizing in illegal state militias that advocated overturning our duly democratic government, an igniter went off in my head and I began making plans.

I was an avid hunter before I went into the Army. Stalking prey was my way of recreation in the wilds of western Virginia. It produced such a tight focus of the here and now that I often lost track of time. The Army, thank you Uncle Sam, taught me how to track humans. It took a couple of years to determine who I would hunt. That changed when I met a guy who said he belonged to the Wolverine Militia in upper Michigan.

I spent a weekend closing Honkey Tonk bars with him in Nashville, along with a lot of other guys sporting quasi military patches and talking about their “units.” I do my best recon when pretending to be drunk or a “little slow.” At six-feet two inches and 240 pounds, I present a menacing profile with bulging biceps, scars over both eyes and my cheek, and fists the size of rump roasts. My piercing pale blue eyes have frozen more than one man in his tracks when trained on him in anger.

After countless shots of whiskey – I should point out here that no man has ever out drunk me – and mugs of beer and platoons of peanuts, I heard a lot of interesting conversations from the mostly wannabee military types who doted on actual veterans like they were emissaries of the God of War. The one recurring theme was they wanted to overthrow the government and my commanding chief. I spent that weekend memorizing names, cell phone numbers, and states with the biggest amount of militia compounds. That’s how I started with Pennsylvania, because there’s 28 seditious militias in the rural areas – more than even Michigan and Montana.

Started with what, you may wonder? Fair enough. The answer is declaring war on all the militia groups in America. I don’t expect to live long enough to fully achieve my mission but it’ll be interesting to see how many I do eliminate. I know I’ll never get rewarded for destroying the would be traitors. That’s okay. It’s not the way I want to go out with accolades from insincere politicians willing to forgive me for slaughtering an unknown number of enemies of the state. I don’t need parades. I’m a loner and I don’t like being anyone’s center of attention. You may fairly assume the reason for that.

I’ve been on plenty of secret missions throughout Southeast Asia, South America, Africa, and Europe. I still hold shooting records for the M-16, AR-15, M1911 Colt pistol, and the Barret 50 Cal-American sniper rifle. I’ve taught hand-to-hand combat to Green Berets and Rangers. I never questioned my superiors. I was a team player when necessary, and a lone wolf when needed. I always preferred the later. Death and I are no strangers. The Grim Reaper follows me around like a puppy waiting to pounce on the souls of my kills. So, where was I? Oh yeah, Pennsylvania.

It was in November when I met Jerry Sigreid who was the commander of the PA Light Foot Militia at a gathering in Gettysburg. State militias were converging upon the hallowed ground because of a rumor. I quickly figured out most didn’t believe the rumor but it was a great opportunity to spend the weekend mingling and boasting about how bad they were. I couldn’t help smiling at times when I saw guys with fat guts hanging over tortured belts ready to burst under the strain. Everyone was packing semi-automatic rifles and wearing rag tag quasi military uniforms and parts of body armor. To me, they looked like a bunch of overgrown and overweight Boy Scouts at a Jamboree. I followed Commander Sigreid around as he greeted other unit commanders throughout the day. On my way back to the hotel room that I booked for the weekend – The Travels Lodge – I planned my first step to slaughtering the treasonous pigs who claimed they were true American patriots. Makes my blood boil just thinking about it. I slept well that night dreaming of the hunting ahead.

The next morning I grabbed my duffle bag and checked out of the motel and followed Commander Sigreid to his compound in the northern part of the state. His Jeep Ranger stayed under the speed limit as I followed in an old 1985 Ford pickup that I purchased while in Tennessee. I pondered about what made him believe that the Constitution granted citizens the power to take back the federal government by force or violence whenever they felt like it? For starters, his unit and all of the rest are illegal. They have no charter from the governor of the state to assemble. As a matter of fact, militias like Sigreids are listed as hate-groups by the Southern Poverty Law Center. I know this because it was part of my recon efforts. I wanted to know where they stood legally. They didn’t, and that made my mission even easier to perform. We drove for hours on rough country roads before coming to a dead end and a barricaded gate with armed guards. I wasn’t surprised, as I knew we were being followed by off road vehicles most of the way in. Anything less would have been a surprise. This group of losers were playing Army as best as they could. Sigreid stuck his head out of the window and hailed the guards with a password and signaled for me to follow him into the compound.

We parked next to a long wooden building that was surrounded by smaller outer buildings that looked like barracks. There was a dirt parade ground that had a tall pole with the American flag dancing in the breeze. We entered the tall building and startled a lounging guard at a desk who nervously jumped to attention and saluted Sigreid. He closed the door after we entered his private office at the end of a long hallway. I listened to him chatter for an hour as my eyes searched the room for clues to his life outside this fantasy world he’d created. Afterwards Sigreid called the guard in and ordered him to show me a room in the NCO barracks. The guard pointed out a building as we walked and stated it was the mess hall and dinner was an hour away. When we got to my room I slung my duffle bag down on a bed that was probably WW I vintage. The private room was at the end of the wooden barracks and the door was painted with a circular logo with PA Light Foot Militia in the center. I slept well until 2 a.m. when I got up for my first kill. It was too easy. I walked into the main compound to find the same guard from earlier sleeping in a chair and broke his neck with a simple twist. The bones snapping sounded like dried-out wood breaking.

The hunt had begun.

The End