Pyrite (Aug. 2023)

The biggest reason Pyrite maintains her attachment to Gem Homeworld culture, even when the official ideals don't align with her own, is that she really depends on it for structure in her own life. Understanding social dynamics does not come easily to her, and she's spent hundreds of years figuring out how to behave in a strict hierarchy. After that structure is dismantled, she's starting from square one - she really doesn't know how to find her own place in it, can't figure it out like neurotypical people can, and doesn't have the social connections to people who might be able to support her. That's why her old boss eventually just recommends she move across the galaxy and do an unrelated thing.

She tends to hold herself to unnecessary rules and standards, sometimes to everyone's detriment (like the time she essentially kidnapped her friend's daughter to reveal a secret just because she didn't want to reveal it herself), but she's also very good at rules lawyering.