diff --git a/dd-java-agent/instrumentation-testing/src/main/groovy/datadog/trace/agent/test/base/HttpServerTest.groovy b/dd-java-agent/instrumentation-testing/src/main/groovy/datadog/trace/agent/test/base/HttpServerTest.groovy
index 9c2aa5988ea..1e1af1a211c 100644
--- a/dd-java-agent/instrumentation-testing/src/main/groovy/datadog/trace/agent/test/base/HttpServerTest.groovy
+++ b/dd-java-agent/instrumentation-testing/src/main/groovy/datadog/trace/agent/test/base/HttpServerTest.groovy
@@ -1234,7 +1234,6 @@ abstract class HttpServerTest<SERVER> extends WithHttpServer<SERVER> {
     }
   }
 
-  @Flaky(value = "https://github.com/DataDog/dd-trace-java/issues/9396", suites = ["PekkoHttpServerInstrumentationAsyncHttp2Test"])
   def "test exception"() {
     setup:
     def method = "GET"
diff --git a/dd-java-agent/instrumentation/pekko/pekko-http-1.0/src/baseTest/scala/PekkoHttpTestWebServer.scala b/dd-java-agent/instrumentation/pekko/pekko-http-1.0/src/baseTest/scala/PekkoHttpTestWebServer.scala
index 54a4983daff..01fca998cd7 100644
--- a/dd-java-agent/instrumentation/pekko/pekko-http-1.0/src/baseTest/scala/PekkoHttpTestWebServer.scala
+++ b/dd-java-agent/instrumentation/pekko/pekko-http-1.0/src/baseTest/scala/PekkoHttpTestWebServer.scala
@@ -275,6 +275,13 @@ object PekkoHttpTestWebServer {
   ): HttpRequest => Future[HttpResponse] = { request =>
     Future {
       syncHandler(request)
+    }.recover { case e: Exception =>
+      // Recover from exceptions to return a proper HTTP response instead of a
+      // failed Future. When the Future fails, the span completion depends on
+      // async continuation cleanup which can race with the test's trace assertion,
+      // causing flaky timeouts waiting for the trace to be written.
+      HttpResponse(status = EXCEPTION.getStatus, entity = e.getMessage)
+        .withDefaultHeaders(defaultHeader)
     }
   }