diff --git a/PLAN.md b/PLAN.md
index 684928c..7eadef4 100644
--- a/PLAN.md
+++ b/PLAN.md
@@ -1045,19 +1045,43 @@ has to be its own commit with its own re-recorded scorecard.
   `$out`/`$merge` durability semantics, whether the expression evaluator is
   shared with M3's pipeline updates, and whether `allowDiskUse` has to stop
   being a lie.
-- **`drop` segfaults when dispatched in-process** — found while writing the
-  positional-refusal tests, unrelated to them, and **reproduces at `3c5eee2`
-  with the change stashed**, so it is not caused by that work. A single
-  `insert` followed by a single `drop` against a `TestDb` engine terminates
-  with SIGSEGV and no stack trace; dropping a collection that never existed is
-  fine. The wire path is clean — 25 insert / refused-update / distinct / drop
-  cycles against a live server on `:27020` all passed — so what differs is the
-  in-process caller, not the command. That matters more than it looks: D1's
-  whole architecture is "in-process server now, library + C API later", and
-  this is the embedding path. **`drop` has no unit test at all** — the only
-  `parse_fake_msg("drop", ...)` calls in the tree were the scratch ones written
-  to find this — which is why it went unseen. Needs its own commit: reproduce
-  it in a committed test first, then fix.
+- **`drop` unlocked the collection it had just freed** — *fixed.* Found while
+  writing the positional-refusal tests and not caused by them; it reproduced
+  at `3c5eee2` with that work stashed.
+
+  A use-after-free, not an allocator quirk. Dispatch held `drop`'s collection
+  lock across the handler, the handler freed the `Collection` the lock lives
+  in, and dispatch then ran `unlock_collection` on freed memory — an atomic
+  read-modify-write inside `Io.RwLock.unlock`. One insert and one drop was
+  enough.
+
+  The wire path not faulting was luck, not safety: 25 insert/drop cycles
+  against a live server pass because the general allocator leaves the freed
+  page mapped, so the atomic write lands somewhere harmless. It was the same
+  undefined behaviour either way, and `testing.allocator` is what made it
+  visible. **`drop` had no unit test at all**, which is why it went unseen.
+
+  Fixed by giving `drop` no collection lock. The catalog lock is what actually
+  excludes: every collection lock in the engine — dispatch, the TTL sweep,
+  `compact`'s rebuild, `write_catalog`, `slab_stats`, reclamation — is taken
+  while holding the catalog at least shared, so `drop` holding it exclusively
+  already keeps all of them out. The collection lock bought exclusion that was
+  already there and paid for it by locking an object about to cease existing.
+
+  That change also made the dispatch epilogue's predicate wrong, and it turned
+  out to have been wrong already: it fired on `locks.coll == .exclusive` as a
+  stand-in for "this was a write", and **`dropDatabase` is the one write that
+  never held a collection lock**, so it had never reached the commit and
+  checkpoint epilogue at all. Now keyed on `kind == .write`.
+
+  Still open, and deliberately not fixed here: `drop_collection` writes no log
+  record, so a dropped collection resurrects on reopen unless a checkpoint
+  happened to run — a pre-existing limitation with its own test at
+  `db.zig:5542`. Separately, `apply_pending_write` (`$out`/`$merge`) calls
+  `drop_collection` under `engine.rwlock` rather than the catalog lock, so it
+  is not excluded by the reasoning above; it holds no collection lock, so it
+  is not this crash, but the two drops disagree about which lock protects the
+  namespace and that wants one answer.
 - **M3 update operators** — open. `distinct` landed first because it was a
   whole missing command with no dependencies, and measuring it turned up three
   things worth keeping, none of which are `distinct`'s to fix:
diff --git a/src/commands.zig b/src/commands.zig
index f8b6c49..1b35d38 100644
--- a/src/commands.zig
+++ b/src/commands.zig
@@ -198,7 +198,19 @@ const command_table = [_]Command{
     // Writes: the target collection exclusively; create/drop take the
     // catalog exclusively (they mutate the maps).
     .{ .name = "create", .kind = .write, .locks = .{ .catalog = .exclusive, .coll = .exclusive }, .handler = cmd_create },
-    .{ .name = "drop", .kind = .write, .locks = .{ .catalog = .exclusive, .coll = .exclusive }, .handler = cmd_drop },
+    // `drop` takes the catalog exclusively and **no collection lock**: it frees
+    // the very Collection a lock would live in, and dispatch then unlocked the
+    // freed memory. That was a use-after-free on an `Io.RwLock`, and under
+    // testing.allocator it is a hard SIGSEGV on the first insert-then-drop.
+    //
+    // Nothing is lost by dropping the lock, because the catalog lock is what
+    // actually excludes here: every collection lock in this engine -- dispatch,
+    // the TTL sweep, `compact`'s rebuild, `write_catalog`, `slab_stats`,
+    // reclamation -- is taken while holding the catalog at least shared, so
+    // holding it exclusively already keeps every one of them out. The
+    // collection lock was buying exclusion that was already there, and paying
+    // for it by locking an object about to cease existing.
+    .{ .name = "drop", .kind = .write, .locks = .{ .catalog = .exclusive }, .handler = cmd_drop },
     .{ .name = "dropDatabase", .kind = .write, .locks = .{ .catalog = .exclusive }, .handler = cmd_drop_database },
     .{ .name = "createIndexes", .kind = .write, .locks = .{ .catalog = .shared, .coll = .exclusive }, .handler = cmd_create_indexes },
     .{ .name = "dropIndexes", .kind = .write, .locks = .{ .catalog = .shared, .coll = .exclusive }, .handler = cmd_drop_indexes },
@@ -313,7 +325,15 @@ pub fn dispatch(ctx: *Context, msg: *wire.Message, reply: *wire.Reply) !void {
         };
         try ctx.engine.commit();
     }
-    if (cmd.locks.coll == .exclusive) {
+    // Keyed on what the command *is*, not on which lock it happened to take.
+    // These two agreed for every command until `drop` gave up its collection
+    // lock, at which point the old `locks.coll == .exclusive` would have
+    // silently stopped committing and checkpointing after a drop. It was
+    // already wrong for `dropDatabase`, the one write that never held a
+    // collection lock: it has been skipping this epilogue all along, so a
+    // dropped database waited for some later write to trigger a checkpoint
+    // before the catalog recording it was written.
+    if (cmd.kind == .write) {
         // Durability (seal + fsync) coalesces across concurrent writers. A
         // commit error deliberately wins over the handler's captured `result`:
         // whether the write reached disk matters more to the client than why
@@ -5533,6 +5553,67 @@ test "distinct applies its filter before collecting" {
     try testing.expectEqual(@as(i32, 33), values[1].int32);
 }
 
+test "drop does not unlock the collection it just freed" {
+    // Regression test for a use-after-free: dispatch held `drop`'s collection
+    // lock across the handler, the handler freed the Collection the lock lives
+    // in, and dispatch then ran `unlock_collection` on freed memory. One
+    // insert and one drop was enough -- SIGSEGV inside `Io.RwLock.unlock`.
+    //
+    // Two things kept it hidden. `drop` had no unit test at all: before this
+    // one, every `parse_fake_msg("drop", ...)` in the tree was inside a test
+    // written to hunt it. And over the wire it did not fault -- 25
+    // insert/drop cycles against a live server pass -- because the general
+    // allocator leaves the freed page mapped, so the atomic write lands
+    // somewhere harmless. testing.allocator is what makes it visible, which
+    // is exactly why this test belongs here rather than in an e2e script.
+    var threaded: std.Io.Threaded = .init_single_threaded;
+    defer threaded.deinit();
+    const io = threaded.io();
+    var tdb = try TestDb.init(io);
+    defer tdb.deinit();
+    var ctx = tdb.ctx(io);
+
+    try dispatch_insert(&tdb, io, "arr", &.{
+        .{ .doc = &.{.{ .key = "_id", .value = .{ .int32 = 1 } }} },
+    });
+    try testing.expectEqual(@as(?i32, null), try run_for_code(&ctx, "drop", .{ .string = "arr" }, &.{}));
+    try testing.expect(ctx.engine.get_collection("test", "arr") == null);
+
+    // The namespace is reusable afterwards, and dropping it again is
+    // NamespaceNotFound rather than a second free.
+    try dispatch_insert(&tdb, io, "arr", &.{
+        .{ .doc = &.{.{ .key = "_id", .value = .{ .int32 = 2 } }} },
+    });
+    try testing.expectEqual(@as(i32, 1), try doc_count(&ctx, "arr"));
+    try testing.expectEqual(@as(?i32, null), try run_for_code(&ctx, "drop", .{ .string = "arr" }, &.{}));
+    try testing.expectEqual(
+        @as(?i32, @intFromEnum(ErrorCode.namespace_not_found)),
+        try run_for_code(&ctx, "drop", .{ .string = "arr" }, &.{}),
+    );
+}
+
+test "dropDatabase frees its collections without unlocking them" {
+    // The same shape one level up, and the reason the epilogue is now keyed on
+    // `kind == .write`: dropDatabase is the one write that never held a
+    // collection lock, so it never reached the commit/checkpoint epilogue.
+    var threaded: std.Io.Threaded = .init_single_threaded;
+    defer threaded.deinit();
+    const io = threaded.io();
+    var tdb = try TestDb.init(io);
+    defer tdb.deinit();
+    var ctx = tdb.ctx(io);
+
+    try dispatch_insert(&tdb, io, "one", &.{
+        .{ .doc = &.{.{ .key = "_id", .value = .{ .int32 = 1 } }} },
+    });
+    try dispatch_insert(&tdb, io, "two", &.{
+        .{ .doc = &.{.{ .key = "_id", .value = .{ .int32 = 2 } }} },
+    });
+    try testing.expectEqual(@as(?i32, null), try run_for_code(&ctx, "dropDatabase", .{ .int32 = 1 }, &.{}));
+    try testing.expect(ctx.engine.get_collection("test", "one") == null);
+    try testing.expect(ctx.engine.get_collection("test", "two") == null);
+}
+
 test "a positional update is refused on the wire and stores nothing" {
     // The end of the chain the unit tests start: the refusal has to reach the
     // client as a code, and the stored document -- not just the working copy