The Kazekage Hero

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or My Hero Academia.

Author's Note: This is my first time writing anything in the My Hero Academia fandom I hope it's a decent first attempt. I know there are at least two other heroes with sand quirks but they're shown very briefly I'm not trying to copy them in fact I'm gonna mostly try to stick with the sand attacks Gaara has been shown to use. Though fighting scenes are not something I'm great at hopefully this story will help that. Anyways, with that said does anyone have any good hero name suggestions for Gaara? Should I just use his title as the Kazekage?

This is unbeta'd, therefore, all mistakes are mine.

Chapter 1: Gaara has a Sand Quirk?

The Kazekage hardly slept, some would call him an insomniac even. He didn't care much for the label, it helped him run his village more effectively and that was what mattered.

However, because he didn't get much sleep dreams were an even more rare occurrence.

Tired green eyes blinked open, Gaara didn't remember nodding off but knew that if he was waking up then he must have. At least that was what he thought until he took in his surroundings.

Gaara shouldn't be looking up at a dark ceiling, last he recalled he was at his desk. The Kage should see his office, desk, or even his own arms if he laid his head down on this for a quick rest.

Conclusion: this was not his office.

Also, it was not his bedroom.

What it was... it was unfamiliar.

The ninja jolted up promptly then and proceeded to fall off of the small cot he had been laying on top of. His sand reacted before he face-planted onto the ground, once on his own two feet the redhead noticed first how unsteady he was as if he was a newborn fawn not used to his own legs.

In line with that thought was his form, it was all wrong.

Gaara's confusion heightened as he realized exactly how small he appeared.

Looking down at his child-like form he was stunned, then as if to prove that it was his own body the boy lifted his small hands and examined them.

They were so tiny.

If he had to guess his age based on his hands, he would say no older than five, if that.

Gaara quickly came to the conclusion that he had in fact not yet awoken, what other explanation could there be? While his dreams were few and far in between when he had dreamt it wasn't uncommon that he was a child when he did.

While not well versed in dreams this one felt oddly more real than any before it.

Temari had once said she had a vivid dream and at the time, she sore it was real. He hadn't been paying attention to what she said it was about, could that be what this was he wondered.

Before he could contemplate more a young voice shouted, "You have a quirk!"

Gaara lifted his eyes to a little boy sitting up in bed across the room.

He was pointing at Gaara obviously indicating that he was talking about him.

The ninja tilted his head in confusion and asked, "I have a what?"

His voice was so young sounding that it startled him, his hands when to his throat.

"Hey look, look at that!" Another boy called out pointing at him also. That's when Gaara realized all the other children, his hands dropped from his neck and his green eyes scanned the room. It was full of young boys some still waking from their own small cots.

All of them looking at him when they did wake.

"Is that sand?" One of them asked.

Gaara's eyes widened and the sand that had been hovering around him in case he lost his balance on his unsteady feet dropped to the ground, just as the door opened. It revealed an older woman with dark hair that was just starting to gray at the temples, she looked none too pleased about being awake.

"What's all this racket so early in the morning?" She gave the young children the stink eye as Temari would've called it.

"He did a quirk!" One of the smaller boys said while bouncing in place in his bed.

"Has a quirk, dummy." A slightly older boy corrected while he reached for a pair of glasses on a nearby side table.

Gaara didn't have any idea what the children were talking about but he guessed it had to do with his sand. As he tried to figure out the bizarre dream his mind had somehow conjured up the woman shirked.

"Who brought all this dirt in here!?" She asked aghast while looking right at him, or more accurately at his feet. His toes wiggled feeling the familiar texture beneath them.

Pale green eyes looked down to the sand he knew was there, it was unusual looking given just how clean the pale tile floors looked. It was clear to the ninja that they were not in the dessert otherwise it would not be possible to keep the floor from having some dust blown in from the sand outside.

"It's his quirk!" The first boy who spoke answered the angry looking woman.

"What?" She looked to the little boy making him squirm for a moment before he bravely answered, "He moved the dirt."

The woman didn't look like she believed him, "He's too small to have gotten all this inside without help so who helped him, hmm?" She asked eyeing the older bigger boys.

Gaara thought about saying that it was him and only him but he mostly just hoped to wait it out and wake up. There was still paperwork to be done and this was a confusing waste of his time.

"Well?" She placed her hands on her hips waiting for them to come clean about their guilt.

"He moved it, it's his quirk!" The same boy insisted.

She shook her head clearly not believing the boy before turning her gaze on Gaara, "Well then go ahead," She waved her hands, "move the sand."

Gaara stared at the patronizing woman blankly, she stared right back with a scowl waiting for him to do as instructed.

What a weird dream this was, he'd never known anything but fear when it came to his sand as a child. Did that mean if he showed her, she'd become afraid and he would wake up?

Finally shaking her head, she turned to the insistent boy and said, "Well Kyo it looks like you just volunteered to clean this mess up."

"What!? Why I didn't do it!" Kyo complained, "Because you know how we deal with liars around here."

"But I wasn't!" He turned to Gaara then and huffed, "Move the dirt!" He stomped his foot as he gave the demand.

No one had ever really ordered the redhead around as this little boy had just done, it was more amusing than anything. Gaara decided to humor the boy so he relented making the sand move. It swirled around beside him shifting until it was the shape of a familiar desert flower.

The ninja had hoped that a flower wouldn't seem too threatening.

The boy grinned triumphantly at the woman, "See I told you so," before he looked back at Gaara and asked, "What took you so long!?"

The woman merely opened and closed her mouth for a moment before she gathered her wits, "Get rid of it, it's dirty." Then her gaze turned on the other boys, "Well since you're all up get dressed and washed up for breakfast." That done she closed the door hard.

For a moment everything was still and quiet then all at once they jumped into action. The young boys all scrambled up and over to Gaara, he backed up until his back hit the side of his mattress. He was cornered and more than a little startled as they all started talking to him about his 'quirk', they asked questions, said it was cool, and the redhead had never felt more overwhelmed.

He had gotten used to people over the last few years. Those of his village even liked him now, it was nice. But his personal space had never been invaded so much by so many. It took all his control not to have his sand lash out. Dream or no he didn't want to cause injury to children.

The oldest boy then shouted, "Quiet! He's not gonna talk if we all crowed him."

He was the tallest and oldest and had also crowed him but the pale-eyed boy wasn't going to say so, he was glad when they backed up and let him breathe a bit.

"Come on let's get ready or we'll get in trouble, we can see his quirk in action during recess. Right?" The last bit was directed at Gaara so he nodded slowly still unsure what a quirk was.

The rest of the kids seemed satisfied and went about their normal morning routine.

He watched them grab their clothes and bathroom supplies and then leave the room. When he was alone the redhead looked down at the sand and let his eyes follow a trail that led back to the window beside his bed, it was opened just a crack. The sand must've gotten in that way... that's very specific for a dream. They weren't usually so detailed were they?

He didn't think so.

Even so, Gaara stood there.

He waited to wake up.

He was still waiting hours later even after he was scolded for taking so long to get dressed and washed up for the day.

In return, the woman from before gave him more chores as a punishment for his untimeliness. Punctuality was a must.

He learned her name was Akiko from overhearing another younger woman speak it, he didn't think it fit her but apparently, they were just to call her Ma'am.

She was in charge of all the boys under ten at what was an orphanage.

He was an orphan here. Not that he was any different when he was awake but at least then he was an adult.

Gaara was more than ready to wake up after one day.

He was slowly beginning to doubt that he ever would as the days passed. Especially once a week had passed and he was still waking up in sis tiny cot inside of his equally small body.

He never slept that long.

Dreams eventually ended, but whatever was happening to him appeared to have no end in sight.

Perhaps he should have called it a nightmare.

Even so, the Kazekage had been through much worse so maybe it was some form of purgatory… probably too tame unless it was meant for someone who couldn't handle the repetitiveness of it.

That someone wasn't Gaara he could handle that with practiced ease. What he had trouble with was that most of the younger kids wanted him to make shapes every day at recess and the older boys wanted him to use his ability to do things like sneak extra food. The green-eyed boy did both when asked thus he became quite popular without meaning too.

He'd never interacted with kids his age when he was actually this old so it was hard to get used to.

Then there was the woman in charge of him, Ma'am.

Anytime she caught him using his sand or rather his 'quirk' she'd scold him for it. She wasn't happy about most of the children's quirks he'd heard she was 'quirkless' but the ninja didn't understand it. Another added she was acting out due to being jealous of their awesomeness.

It was hard to grasp those things but he did get what the others meant by her being something of a clean freak. That was why she was his prime target, whenever he saw her the once-ninja did his best to go the other way but with his small legs he was more often than not caught.

It was humiliating for someone who was once the Kazekage.

He noticed shortly after his 'quirk manifested' anytime something became dirty she instantly sought him out. Then she would place the blame on him, whether the redhead had done it or not. Usually, he didn't, besides the sand, he kept on his persons he knew to leave it just outside his window else he spend the day making the boy's room spotless.

Another thing he grew to dislike in his new environment was bath time. It wasn't because of anything childish like not wanting to take one but rather he wanted to do so by himself and well that meant removing the layer of sand and then putting it back on after the bath.

That hadn't gone over well.

Now Ma'am would pull out a wet rag around him to clean his face and hands at the random. Anytime it wiped off the thin layer of sand he'd get sent to his room or have another chore thrown at him.

Gaara was probably the cleanest he'd been in his life and he was beginning to truly dislike the feel of it.

It took some time but the redhead had always been smart, he found his way around the daily face and hand checks for sand or as Ma'am called it dirt.

He was a ninja so the boy knew how to be stealthy even if he rarely used that talent before now. It was just a different battlefield here and so the Kage had a small period of adjustment to work out the quirks… pun not intended.

In the end, simple was the best.

Every time she'd approach, he'd shift his sand layer to other places leaving not even one grain behind on either his face or hands.

Bath time was on a schedule so before it was his turn, he'd create a sand clone of himself or something that could move freely then it'd hide nearby until he got done. As soon as she was out of sight, he'd call his sand back.

It was hard to find time away from the others so when she added more chores on him for any dirt she found the redhead used that time to not only complete the chore but train. In his tiny body, he wasn't what he once was, he had to rebuild muscle. Unfortunately, he couldn't create and carry a gourd he'd tried but was told in no certain terms to stop playing with his dirt as it was making his clothes dirty.

Still, his control was excellent but with less sand to manipulate he had to adapt his fighting style to make up for less sand and well he could test to see how much he could use without making a crater and causing a scene both of which was sure to be frowned upon.

Gaara missed the dessert.

Everything here was so stone? No concrete would be more accurate, he wasn't used to being in a city.

There were trees and he still had sand but not as much as he'd like. Here he felt more limited, not even the other ninja villages aside from the ones known for water or snow left him feeling like this but even then, it was temporary because he could return home.

"Can you make a sand puppy?" A little blonde girl asked pulling him from his thoughts, she reminded him of a younger version of his sister for a moment.

Gaara missed her and Kankuro, knowing better than to dwell on those he missed he pushed the feelings away and focused on the present.

The pale-eyed boy only saw the orphan girls during recess and mealtimes other than that they were at opposite sides of the orphanage.

Gaara nodded and waved his hand creating a puppy out of sand, she giggled and soon she was playing fetch using a stick she'd picked up.

"That's awesome!" Another kid yelled, "Hey Gaara made a sand dog!" A few others ran over to play with the dog, pets weren't allowed so many got excited at the idea of playing with one even one made entirely of sand.

There was a positive side he supposed, "Come on," A girl grabbed his arm, "you play too!"

Gaara smiled as he let himself be pulled to the group to play with the puppy he'd created. The positive side was once-Kage had found that he liked playing with the kids more than he thought he would.

Perhaps because he was never allowed to do so as a child, or maybe he just liked kids. As an adult, he hadn't spent any time with them either at least not ones that weren't already ninjas.

Even child ninjas were seen as adults to an extent by those in the same field.

Time passed as it tended to do.

Before he knew it Gaara had been at the orphanage for three years.

Gaara had learned in his years in this strange world that most people had some type of power called quirks and some made careers out of it. Like ninjas only they called themselves heroes, it seemed a bit pretentious to him.

However, the ninja in him wouldn't allow for him to stay a civilian so if becoming a 'hero' was the alternative he'd become one.

Sadly, at six years old the once-ninja knew he had a long time until he could make a move towards his new goal. Much longer than if he was simply becoming a ninja. So, with that in mind, he expected several more years of the same thing.

What Gaara didn't count on was getting adopted.

Author's Note: Drop a review, if you feel like it! Does anyone have any ideas for who adopts Gaara? Also, I eventually I wanna add some pairings so who do you think would be a good choice for Gaara?