She had tried everything. She adjusted the Corey relative permeability curves. She tweaked the endpoint saturations. She even whispered a prayer to the ghost of Henry Darcy. Nothing worked. The simulated water cut rose too slowly, then too fast, like a bad actor missing cues.

Maya’s heart thumped.

It wasn't the official one. It was a copy passed down from her mentor, Raj, who got it from his mentor, who allegedly got it from a Shell engineer in the 1980s. It smelled of old paper, printer toner, and desperation.