Read "Code Talker" by Joseph Bruchac online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
From Bougainville the other code talkers and I went back to Hawaii. There were more changes in our code to make up, learn, and share. Words had to be added for new weapons, military terms, and situations of war. Armored, tracers, napalm. Each had to have its equivalent in Navajo. Among those new words was one that we'd grown to know far too well. Abí zi'aah. That means "pick 'em off." It was our code word for sniper. Just saying it made me want to duck my head down, remembering my recent experience on Bougainville.
Our Navajo secret code that had begun with a vocabulary of only 265 words was now almost twice that size. Code talkers were in such demand that recruiters were having a hard time finding enough qualified Navajos. Although many commanders had been hesitant at first about trusting Navajos with their most crucial messages, they'd learned to depend on us. Situations in the field had shown our worth.