“That’s not the only question. What is the ring doing with all the energy it’s storing? Not keeping us warm—we’re not even a rounding error in that calculation. But the energy must be going somewhere. If it isn’t raising the temperature of the ring, it’s gone somewhere else. It must be.” She went on, rambling as though she thought Lucky was still listening. “I thought it was a habitat for pony civilization, but if that was the case, why kill them? Is it culturing them, raising them to a certain level of advancement, then harvesting them to start anew? But the resources on the ring are finite, that would accomplish nothing except—”