Ever since you have known Mark, he’s been insufferable. It started when you were in the Teen Team together, and his powers blew everyone’s out of the water. You could be civil, compliment him on whatever PR he reaching in training or his quick thinking during missions, but it got to a point where you swear he was getting full of himself.

He started jumping the gun as soon as he saw a window to save somebody, even if he knew you could’ve done it. He stopped using his comms sometimes, leaving you and the team stranded until he was ready to help. He started showing up just before someone could get seriously injured. Worst of all, Cecil just let it happen. He treated Mark like he was some golden child, pushed everyone else to the side just to coddle him. Maybe it wasn’t that accurate, but that’s what it felt like.

Were you jealous of no longer being the GDA’s favorite? Was it the fact that no one marvels at your gift to control the elements? Maybe, but he was hot shit and he knew it. Flaunted it. Rubbed it in your face that you could be beaten into a pulp and they’d still put a bandage over Mark’s paper cut before they’d offered you a hospital bed.

The irritation was mutual. Mark didn’t understand why you switched up so quickly. He liked you a lot at the start, but after his fight in Chicago with Omni-Man, you hardly even looked at him. At first he figured it was because of his blood, that he was going to try and take over Earth, but it was something more professional than that. He noticed the roll of your eyes when he’d show up late to missions, how his comms were always down while you were getting your ass handed to you by whatever freak with a need for vengeance. It wasn’t like he wanted it to be like this. Cecil was constantly keeping him busy with missions across the galaxy, and he didn’t exactly have a lot of time to himself trying to work through relationship problems with Amber, and catch up on homework from his courses. So, yeah, he did like you, before you stopped thinking of him as a person and as a machine, like you.

So no. You and Invincible didn’t get along. And you didn’t care if it stayed that way, until Cecil was calling you over to the edge of the ocean. A crater in the sand left you stunned, and you see an injured Mark in the center of it—Invincible beaten to a pulp—you could feel your stomach sink. They had you clean the sand away from his wounds and use the water in his body to keep him from bleeding out until the rescue helicopter came to pick him up. And when he healed, and relayed the accident to the GDA, Amber broke up with him, and then Angstrong Levy had his mom and half brother held hostage, and then he had killed Angstrong. Suddenly it felt wrong to not feel bad. Maybe you had been too hard on him.

What he didn’t tell you about was the dimensions he jumped through during his encounter with Levy. How he had met an older version of you, a sweet woman that spoke fondly of her Mark. How she had told him stories about them and how much she had missed him after he was killed by Viltrumites.

One of Mark’s first missions back was just patrol. Cecil wanted him to keep moving during after his recovery, but didn’t want him doing anything intense. ‘For your sake,’ Cecil told Mark, but he’d only roll his eyes.

You spotted him on a rooftop, mask pulled off and staring out to the city below. You landed carefully, coming up to his side and quietly sitting beside him.

Mark sensed you immediately, glancing at you with a flat expression.

“…What, Cecil thinks I need help?” He questioned bitterly, eyeing you suspiciously as you sat down.

Your reason was personal; you just wanted to check in.