diff --git a/supacode/Infrastructure/AgentDetection/AgentSessionResolver.swift b/supacode/Infrastructure/AgentDetection/AgentSessionResolver.swift
index 68884831..a4caf94e 100644
--- a/supacode/Infrastructure/AgentDetection/AgentSessionResolver.swift
+++ b/supacode/Infrastructure/AgentDetection/AgentSessionResolver.swift
@@ -640,8 +640,16 @@ nonisolated enum AgentSessionFingerprintMatcher {
   /// Reference implementation. `normalize` must agree with it for every input;
   /// `AgentSessionFingerprintNormalizeTests` asserts that over a corpus.
   static func normalizeGeneral(_ value: String) -> String {
-    value
-      .replacing(#/\u{001B}\[[0-?]*[ -\/]*[@-~]/#, with: " ")
+    // A pattern anchored on ESC cannot match a string with no ESC byte, and
+    // nearly every transcript fragment has none. Proving absence with a byte
+    // scan is several times cheaper than letting the regex engine walk the
+    // whole string to reach the same conclusion.
+    let stripped =
+      value.utf8.contains(0x1B)
+      ? value.replacing(#/\u{001B}\[[0-?]*[ -\/]*[@-~]/#, with: " ")
+      : value
+    return
+      stripped
       .lowercased()
       .split(whereSeparator: \Character.isWhitespace)
       .joined(separator: " ")
diff --git a/supacodeTests/AgentSessionFingerprintNormalizeTests.swift b/supacodeTests/AgentSessionFingerprintNormalizeTests.swift
index c87ca26a..c8ee1462 100644
--- a/supacodeTests/AgentSessionFingerprintNormalizeTests.swift
+++ b/supacodeTests/AgentSessionFingerprintNormalizeTests.swift
@@ -47,12 +47,26 @@ struct AgentSessionFingerprintNormalizeTests {
     "mixed ascii and ünicode with  spacing",
   ]
 
-  @Test func fastPathMatchesReferenceForEveryCorpusInput() {
+  /// The original formulation, before either the ASCII fast path or the
+  /// escape-absence guard. Both shipped paths must reproduce it exactly.
+  private static func pristine(_ value: String) -> String {
+    value
+      .replacing(#/\u{001B}\[[0-?]*[ -\/]*[@-~]/#, with: " ")
+      .lowercased()
+      .split(whereSeparator: \Character.isWhitespace)
+      .joined(separator: " ")
+  }
+
+  @Test func bothPathsMatchTheOriginalForEveryCorpusInput() {
     for input in Self.corpus {
+      let expected = Self.pristine(input)
+      #expect(
+        AgentSessionFingerprintMatcher.normalize(input) == expected,
+        "normalize diverged for \(String(reflecting: input))"
+      )
       #expect(
-        AgentSessionFingerprintMatcher.normalize(input)
-          == AgentSessionFingerprintMatcher.normalizeGeneral(input),
-        "normalize diverged from the reference for \(String(reflecting: input))"
+        AgentSessionFingerprintMatcher.normalizeGeneral(input) == expected,
+        "normalizeGeneral diverged for \(String(reflecting: input))"
       )
     }
   }
@@ -65,10 +79,14 @@ struct AgentSessionFingerprintNormalizeTests {
     for _ in 0..<2000 {
       let length = Int.random(in: 0...40, using: &generator)
       let input = String((0..<length).map { _ in alphabet.randomElement(using: &generator)! })
+      let expected = Self.pristine(input)
+      #expect(
+        AgentSessionFingerprintMatcher.normalize(input) == expected,
+        "normalize diverged for \(String(reflecting: input))"
+      )
       #expect(
-        AgentSessionFingerprintMatcher.normalize(input)
-          == AgentSessionFingerprintMatcher.normalizeGeneral(input),
-        "normalize diverged from the reference for \(String(reflecting: input))"
+        AgentSessionFingerprintMatcher.normalizeGeneral(input) == expected,
+        "normalizeGeneral diverged for \(String(reflecting: input))"
       )
     }
   }