diff --git a/AGENTS.md b/AGENTS.md
index a86b4cf..5d66444 100644
--- a/AGENTS.md
+++ b/AGENTS.md
@@ -379,4 +379,10 @@ exactly 140.
   second `send()` on the public surface or a changed `ReconnectOptions.onConnected`.
   The gate is told what happened and never reads back into the session: a collaborator that has to
   ask does not own its decision, which is how the first cut ended up answering the same question two
-  different ways at admit and at release.
+  different ways at admit and at release. For the same reason the retry in `send()` asks
+  `gate.isUp()` rather than `linkDown()`, which also reads the socket: a condition that loops on
+  something the gate does not gate on spins against a gate that admits it straight back.
+  `LinkGate.returning` is a copy of `retrying()` taken at teardown, and stays true only because
+  nothing stops the reconnect loop without `emitClose()` following it — `drain()` and `end()` are the
+  only callers of `stop()`. An `OutgoingRequests` owning both would not need the copy; until then,
+  a third caller of `stop()` has to shut the gate itself.
diff --git a/src/session.ts b/src/session.ts
index 6f6d65d..8007073 100644
--- a/src/session.ts
+++ b/src/session.ts
@@ -189,7 +189,8 @@ export class Session extends EventEmitter<SessionEvents> {
 			const attempt = await this.attempt(input, options).finally(() => { this.window.release(); });
 
 			// Nothing reached the socket, so the next link carries it instead of the caller resending.
-			if (!attempt.retryOnNextLink || !this.linkDown() || !this.retrying()) return attempt.result;
+			// The gate's own answer, or a loop round one that admits everything spins on a dead socket.
+			if (!attempt.retryOnNextLink || this.gate.isUp() || !this.retrying()) return attempt.result;
 		}
 	}