Location from The Expanse by James S.A. Corey
The hub — a sphere of space connecting 1,373 ring gates to different star systems. Built by the Ring Builders, governed by rules that humanity doesn't fully understand. The slow zone where physics bends and ships that go too fast simply vanish.
The Ring Space is the Ring Builders' transit hub, constructed using physics that human science cannot explain. It exists outside normal spacetime — a pocket dimension connecting thirteen hundred star systems through gates that fold space rather than crossing it. Every gate leads to a different system, each one selected by the Ring Builders for reasons humanity can only guess at. The slow zone enforces rules. Ships that exceed a certain velocity simply cease to exist — consumed by the same entities that killed the Ring Builders themselves. This speed limit makes the Ring Space a chokepoint where any fleet can be bottlenecked, which is why controlling Medina Station at its center became the most important strategic objective in human space. The Ring Builders created this network over a billion years ago, connecting thousands of star systems in a civilization that spanned the galaxy. Something killed them — something that exists in the spaces between the gates, something that notices when too much energy flows through the network. The Ring Space is a road built by a dead civilization, and whatever killed the builders is still watching the traffic.
An impossible space — a sphere approximately one million kilometers across, its boundary marked by the ring gates arranged in a precise geometric pattern. Each gate appears as a glowing ring-shaped aperture, and through each one lies a different star system. The space between gates is dark, featureless, and wrong — stars are visible through the gates but the space itself has no stellar background. Light behaves differently here. The Ring Station — the alien structure at the center — pulses with blue-tinged energy, dormant but aware.
Also known as: Ring Space, Slow Zone, Ring Gate Hub