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The smell of coffee and the faint, rhythmic thud of a heavy bag being pummeled pulled me from sleep. I blinked, stretching an arm across the empty, cool side of the bed. MJ was already up. Not unusual. What was unusual was the sound. That wasn't her yoga playlist.

I pulled on a pair of sweatpants and padded out into the living area, which we’d half-converted into a gym. And then I stopped dead.

There was a stranger in my apartment.

A very, very jacked stranger. Broad shoulders strained against a tight black tank top that was, I realized, just the symbiote in a different form. Powerful quadriceps and defined calves shifted with each explosive movement as they slammed into the heavy bag with a series of punches and kicks that would make Captain America nod in approval.

Then the stranger turned, wiping sweat from a brow with a thick, muscular forearm.

It was MJ’s face—but… not. Her features were sharper, stronger. A strong, square jawline. A shorter, almost buzz-cut style of fiery red hair that accentuated the powerful lines of her neck and skull. She looked like a Olympic-level boxer who’d been carved from marble and then injected with pure, raw power.

“Morning, sleepyhead,” she said. Her voice was lower, a husky, resonant rumble that vibrated in my chest.

My mouth hung open. “MJ…?”

She grinned, a flash of white teeth in her decidedly more masculine face. “The one and only.” She finished her set, the heavy bag swaying violently. “Just trying something new. The suit… it responds to intent. I was thinking about raw power, about strength training, and it… well, it optimized.”

She flexed an arm, and the biceps and triceps bulged impressively. “Pretty cool, right? I can bench press the couch now. Don’t worry,” she added, seeing my stunned expression, “it’s all surface-level morphology. The important parts are still all woman.” She winked, and the gesture was so utterly MJ in this bizarre new package that I couldn’t help but laugh.

“You’re incredible,” I breathed, walking over to her. I reached out, tentatively touching her shoulder. The muscle was hard as rock under the slick surface of the symbiote. “So you’re telling me… under all this…” I gestured to her general jacked-ness.

In response, the symbiote-shaped shorts dissolved, revealing that she was, indeed, telling the absolute truth. The fundamental topography was reassuringly, beautifully feminine.

“See?” she …