diff --git a/agent-bouncer/agent-bouncer.sh b/agent-bouncer/agent-bouncer.sh
index a062522..1f472b4 100644
--- a/agent-bouncer/agent-bouncer.sh
+++ b/agent-bouncer/agent-bouncer.sh
@@ -45,6 +45,15 @@ for agent in "$ODD_AGENT" "$EVEN_AGENT"; do
   fi
 done
 
+# RNPT-05 parity: bound every bounce dispatch with invoke_agent_with_timeout so a
+# network-stalled claude/codex read can't hang the run forever (the cause of the
+# multi-hour zombie this guard was added for). Keeps the 3-arg
+# invoke_<agent>(prompt, output, stderr) convention that validate_output's retry
+# callback requires; closes over the per-pass global AGENT_NAME.
+invoke_agent_bounded() {
+  invoke_agent_with_timeout "$AGENT_NAME" "$1" "$2" "$3"
+}
+
 # Generate a run name from the document content.
 # R-3: the LLM naming call is best-effort sugar — skip it entirely when the
 # codex CLI is absent, and fall back to a filename-derived label either way.
@@ -59,7 +68,7 @@ $(head -20 "$PLAN_FILE")"
   NAME_OUTPUT_FILE=$(mktemp)
   NAME_STDERR_FILE=$(mktemp)
   printf '%s' "$NAME_PROMPT" > "$NAME_PROMPT_FILE"
-  invoke_codex "$NAME_PROMPT_FILE" "$NAME_OUTPUT_FILE" "$NAME_STDERR_FILE"
+  invoke_agent_with_timeout codex "$NAME_PROMPT_FILE" "$NAME_OUTPUT_FILE" "$NAME_STDERR_FILE"
   CANDIDATE=$(tr -d '\r\n ' < "$NAME_OUTPUT_FILE" | head -c 60 || true)
   rm -f "$NAME_PROMPT_FILE" "$NAME_OUTPUT_FILE" "$NAME_STDERR_FILE"
 fi
@@ -156,10 +165,12 @@ $(cat "$TEMPLATE_DIR/bounce-protocol.md")"
   rm -f "$OUTPUT_FILE"
   STDERR_FILE="${RUN_DIR}/pass-${PASS}-stderr.log"
   RETRY_STDERR_FILE="${RUN_DIR}/pass-${PASS}-stderr-retry.log"
-  "invoke_${AGENT_NAME}" "$PROMPT_FILE" "$OUTPUT_FILE" "$STDERR_FILE"
+  invoke_agent_bounded "$PROMPT_FILE" "$OUTPUT_FILE" "$STDERR_FILE"
   # 8th arg (first-pass stderr) lets validate_output fail fast on
   # CLI-missing / auth-failure instead of accepting error text (R-1/R-2).
-  validate_output "$PLAN_FILE" "$OUTPUT_FILE" "$AGENT_NAME" "invoke_${AGENT_NAME}" "$PROMPT_FILE" "$RETRY_STDERR_FILE" 30 "$STDERR_FILE" || exit 1
+  # Retry callback is the bounded shim too, so the empty/short-output retries
+  # inside validate_output are time-boxed as well (RNPT-05).
+  validate_output "$PLAN_FILE" "$OUTPUT_FILE" "$AGENT_NAME" invoke_agent_bounded "$PROMPT_FILE" "$RETRY_STDERR_FILE" 30 "$STDERR_FILE" || exit 1
 
   cp "$OUTPUT_FILE" "${RUN_DIR}/pass-${PASS}-${ROLE}-${AGENT_NAME}-raw.md"
 
diff --git a/co-evolve-bouncer.sh b/co-evolve-bouncer.sh
index 6114b2a..ccae302 100644
--- a/co-evolve-bouncer.sh
+++ b/co-evolve-bouncer.sh
@@ -206,6 +206,13 @@ done
 TASK_AS_PATH=""
 [[ -n "$TASK" ]] && TASK_AS_PATH=$(normalize_path_for_bash "$TASK")
 
+# RNPT-05 parity: compose/bounce phases now dispatch through
+# invoke_agent_with_timeout, which runs the claude adapter inside a
+# `timeout ... bash -c 'source lib; invoke_claude'` subprocess that re-sources
+# the lib (re-applying the CLAUDE_MODEL default at line 59). Export so a
+# --claude-model override survives that boundary instead of silently resetting.
+export CLAUDE_MODEL
+
 # Phase 3 LAB-01: opt-in lab routing. Dispatch BEFORE any side effects
 # (RUN_DIR creation, interview, compose). Byte-parity invariant (L-03):
 # when LAB_MODE is empty, this block is a no-op and the rest of the script
@@ -453,7 +460,7 @@ ${CONTEXT_BLOCK}${INPUT_CONTENT}"
   log " Agent: $AGENT_A"
   log " Input: $INPUT_TYPE ($(echo "$INPUT_CONTENT" | wc -w | tr -d '\r\n ') words)"
 
-  invoke_agent "$AGENT_A" "$compose_prompt_file" "$compose_output_file" "$compose_stderr_file"
+  invoke_agent_with_timeout "$AGENT_A" "$compose_prompt_file" "$compose_output_file" "$compose_stderr_file"
 
   # R-1/R-2: fail fast on CLI-missing / auth-failure (rc 2) instead of
   # accepting the error text as a composed document or burning a retry.
@@ -466,7 +473,7 @@ ${CONTEXT_BLOCK}${INPUT_CONTENT}"
   if [[ ! -s "$compose_output_file" ]] || (( $(wc -w < "$compose_output_file" | tr -d '\r\n ') < 10 )); then
     log " WARNING: compose returned empty or minimal output. Retrying once..."
     : > "$compose_output_file"
-    invoke_agent "$AGENT_A" "$compose_prompt_file" "$compose_output_file" "$compose_retry_stderr_file"
+    invoke_agent_with_timeout "$AGENT_A" "$compose_prompt_file" "$compose_output_file" "$compose_retry_stderr_file"
 
     compose_artifact_rc=0
     validate_agent_artifact "$compose_output_file" "$compose_retry_stderr_file" "$AGENT_A" || compose_artifact_rc=$?
@@ -568,7 +575,7 @@ $(cat "$PROTOCOL_TEMPLATE")"
     log " BOUNCE $pass/$total_passes - ${role} (${current_agent})"
     log "--------------------------------------------"
 
-    invoke_agent "$current_agent" "$prompt_file" "$output_file" "$stderr_file"
+    invoke_agent_with_timeout "$current_agent" "$prompt_file" "$output_file" "$stderr_file"
 
     # Validate output. R-1/R-2: rc 2 = CLI missing or unauthenticated — an
     # auth-error page must never be copied into WORKING_FILE as the document,
@@ -581,7 +588,7 @@ $(cat "$PROTOCOL_TEMPLATE")"
 
     if [[ ! -s "$output_file" ]]; then
       log " WARNING: ${current_agent} returned empty output. Retrying..."
-      invoke_agent "$current_agent" "$prompt_file" "$output_file" "$stderr_file"
+      invoke_agent_with_timeout "$current_agent" "$prompt_file" "$output_file" "$stderr_file"
 
       bounce_artifact_rc=0
       validate_agent_artifact "$output_file" "$stderr_file" "$current_agent" || bounce_artifact_rc=$?
diff --git a/lib/co-evolution.sh b/lib/co-evolution.sh
index 8478cf7..5f9db2c 100644
--- a/lib/co-evolution.sh
+++ b/lib/co-evolution.sh
@@ -1603,7 +1603,7 @@ invoke_agent_with_timeout() {
         "${BASH_SOURCE[0]}" "$prompt_file" "$output_file" "$stderr_file" \
         || exit_code=$?
       ;;
-    opus)
+    claude|opus)
       _run_with_phase_timeout "$effective_timeout" \
         bash -c 'source "$1"; invoke_claude "$2" "$3" "$4" "$5"' _ \
         "${BASH_SOURCE[0]}" "$prompt_file" "$output_file" "$stderr_file" "$writable" \