oh yeah, also I've been dwelling on the Mars-Mercury conjunction.
I have this in the first house. Apparently this can be indicative of a sharp tongue (guilty as charged, even when I don't mean to). In Vedic terms it can indicate a troublesome sibling (which I can attest to). Since this is in your friend's 7th house I can only assume that rather that him owning this acidic tongue he feels that others are being critical of him.
This aspect is very close to the Asc-Desc axis and with Neptune rising, opposing both, perhaps he worries (maybe with reason) that others are spreading false accusations about him.