The Expanse's Ring entities mystery has haunted the Rocinante crew (and the show's audience) for seasons - here's what we know, and what happens to ships vanishing during transit through the Ring Gates. Since James Holden answered that fateful distress call on the Canterbury, it's been one calamity after another for The Expanse's Protomolecule-friendly protagonist. In truth, the wheels of fate were already in motion; Holden merely inserted himself into their grinding mechanism.
Eight years before The Expanse begins, Protomolecule is discovered within the Saturn moon of Phoebe. Alongside wealthy researcher Jules-Pierre Mao, Earth and Mars begin delving into the science behind this strange blue substance... and prove woefully out of their depth. The Protomolecule continues to build and enhance itself before fulfilling its core purpose of transforming into a giant portal (later dubbed the Ring Gate) filled with doorways to other systems in the galaxy. As powerful as the Protomolecule is, however, a greater opposing force is balancing out the equation in The Expanse - the Ring entities.
Also known as dark gods, unknown aggressors, or goths (because they enjoy The Cure, presumably), these aliens have become increasing prominent throughout The Expanse season 6, and present one final villain for James Holden to overcome. The alien enemies have begun spiriting away ships as they pass through the Ring network, making them a direct threat to the Sol system. But what exactly is that threat?
What We Know About The Expanse's Ring Entity Origins
Several billion years before James Holden was hauling ice and indulging in zero-G sex sessions aboard the Canterbury, those responsible for creating the Protomolecule dominated our Milky Way galaxy. Utilizing the substance's hive mind, this ancient alien empire developed Ring Gates to spread throughout countless other systems. Saturn's Phoebe moon was likely thrown toward Sol for this very purpose, but got caught in the planet's gravity (nice save, Saturn!), and by the time Earth and Mars awoke the Protomolecule within Phoebe, its creators had already been dead for many millions of years... thanks to the Ring entities.
Revealed to Holden by The Investigator (wearing the face of Joe Miller) in The Expanse seasons 3 and 4, the Protomolecule empire reigned supreme for a long time, but incurred the wrath of something beyond its domain. This second alien force wiped out the Ring builders entirely, for reasons The Expanse has yet to address. No one knows exactly where the Ring entities came from, nor how old their kind might be, but the ease with which they ended the Protomolecule creators' galaxy-spanning civilization demonstrates a godlike level of cosmic power.
The Expanse's first evidence of the Ring entities' existence came with season 4's artifact, discovered on Ilus by James Holden and Elvi Okoye. Also called the "bomb," "anomaly," or a "void bullet," this glowing black sphere represents the sole physical sign of the Ring entities' presence outside the network itself. Though the weapon has no effect on Holden or Okoye (other than giving them an immense sense of dread), it completely decimates anything to do with the Protomolecule - including The Investigator. This indicates the Ring entities aren't a race of violent conquerors; their quarrel lies directly with anyone using Protomolecule.
Why The Ring Entities Attack Ships Passing Through The Network
Now the Protomolecule is active once more in The Expanse, so too are the Ring entities. James Holden constantly warned Fred Johnson, Chrisjen Avasarala, and anyone else who'd listen that the alien threat lingering in the background was a major problem. Those omens finally came true in The Expanse season 5's finale, when the Martian Barkeith disappeared while traversing the Ring Gate en route to Laconia. Holden and Okoye have since determined that the species who destroyed the Protomolecule builders (and created the artifact on Ilus) are behind the incident, and other ships have met a similar fate.
Okoye cameos in The Expanse to explain why only a handful of ships are being attacked by the Ring entities, while others sail through safely. Her studies have detected a mass energy threshold, meaning ships will only disappear when a large amount of energy has passed through the network. In practice, this means the more vessels go through a gate, and the more energy they consume doing so, the threshold will be met and the Ring entities appear. Okoye's theory explains the Barkeith's vanishing, as Sauveterre's battleship was the last in a procession of Martian ships fleeing to Laconia after Marco Inaros seized Medina Station.
The Expanse is keeping the Ring entities' motivations dark for now, but a few important inferences can be made. After their experiences with the Protomolecule and the artifact on Ilus, Holden and Okoye can sense the Ring entities whenever they pass through the network, and the Rocinante captain believes they're gradually getting angrier with each transit - like a sleeping dog being disturbed by an ever-growing swarm of gnats. Holden reckons the Ring entities will eventually wake up for good if Sol and its colonies continue travelling through The Expanse's Rings. Combined with the Ilus bomb proving harmless to Okoye, Holden's observations confirm the Ring entities are not a war-faring race; they just have some major celestial beef with the Protomolecule. Attacking the ships is either an act of retaliation, or designed to prevent too many vessels passing through.
Despite what their moniker implies, The Expanse's Ring entities don't actually dwell inside the Ring. Holden, Okoye and The Investigator make clear that these extra-terrestrials hail from somewhere beyond our own galaxy. The enigmatic species must "hijack" the Rings to move from their realm into ours. When targeting ships, the Ring entities take the form of black goopy tendrils, though this isn't necessarily their physical shape (if, indeed, they have one).
What Happens To Ships The Expanse's Ring Entities Attack
The fate of the Barkeith and other ships unfortunate enough to incur the Ring entities' wrath remains unknown in The Expanse. Holden, Okoye and Naomi have studied the phenomenon (known in the books as "going dutchman") throughout The Expanse season 6, but have failed to find any trace of the vanished vessels. The ships enter one side of the Ring Gate, and absolutely nothing comes out the other side. There's no metal wreckage, no floating crew corpses. Not even a single fiber that could be identified as the Barkeith's remains once the Ring entities' work is done.
This means ships that go dutchman are either destroyed at a minuscule atomic level, or they're transported to whatever realm the Ring entities come from. Both options remain open, but transportation remains unlikely. The Expanse's Ring entities are the story's most advanced extra-terrestrial civilization, meaning they'll have little use for a humble Martian battleship and its traitorous crew. They haven't sent a random note demanding "one million dollars" in exchange for the Barkeith's safe return either, so we can perhaps assume the disappeared ships are getting decimated so completely, not even the slightest trace remains.
That explanation fits with Elvi Okoye's experience touching the artifact on Ilus. The scientist described feeling the "spaces between things," which Holden compares to the sensation he gets whenever transitioning through a Ring Gate and sensing the dark gods. Should these entities comprehend the fabric of the universe down to its very atoms, it makes sense they can turn an entire ship and its crew into nothingness without leaving a scrap behind. If dutchman victims are transported to the Ring entities' universe, they surely arrive in the form of pure energy - not the same physical form they took beforehand - meaning, in effect, the subjects are still destroyed.
What The Expanse's Later Books Reveal About The Ring Entities
Caution: spoilers ahead for The Expanse book series
The Expanse TV adaptation on Amazon Prime is slated to end after season 6, cutting off the narrative three books early. Predictably, this final trio of volumes is where James S.A. Corey delivers the juiciest details about the Ring entities, clearing up many ongoing mysteries. Having said that, their motivations and history can be more or less extrapolated from the information already given on TV.
The Protomolecule builders' Ring network relies on the existence of a Slow Zone - the aqua green lobby housing entrances to over 1000 different systems. The Expanse's final books reveal how the Slow Zone siphons energy from an older universe - the home of the dark gods. The Protomolecule builders built their own civilization by harming another. How the Slow Zone actually effects them isn't explained, but the Ring entities weren't best pleased with their home being exploited as fuel for the Protomolecule network, so duly wiped out the offending species. The activation of Sol's Ring Gate in The Expanse's timeline is now incurring the godlike entities' wrath all over again. They can only be stopped by removing the Ring Gate and the Protomolecule from play completely, ceasing damage to the goths' universe, and cutting off their route into ours.
The Expanse's final books also feature another way the Ring entities can attack, aside from the ship disappearances. The artifact found on Ilus doesn't only turn off Protomolecule - it can mess with the consciousness of living beings across an entire solar system. By dropping one into our universe, the Ring entities can mentally attack Earth, Mars and the Belt alike in retaliation for the Protomolecule's parasitic effect on their universe.