The 2025 One Chicago Crossover Featured A Pairing I Didn’t Know I Needed After 9 Years

After more than five years, the One Chicago TV shows finally reunite in 2025, and the three-hour episode focuses on one pairing that surprisingly never worked together in previous crossovers. The event begins with a mysterious gas explosion at a government building. Consequently, characters from Chicago Fire, Chicago PD, and Chicago Med join forces to rescue victims and investigate who is behind the attack. Throughout the highly anticipated crossover, many lives are at stake (including those of a handful of familiar faces) as Firehouse 51, the Intelligence Unit, and Gaffney Chicago Medical Center race against the clock to save their own.

Thankfully, every One Chicago character makes it out alive. However, it’s touch and go for a few of them for a long time, keeping viewers on the edge of their seats for three hours. One of the perpetrators shoots Chicago PD‘s Trudy Platt in the back, leaving her in critical condition until Chicago Med‘s Dr. Caitlin Lenox and Dr. Mitch Ripley save her. Meanwhile, one Chicago Fire character and another from Chicago PD are stuck underground on a train. The two, who have never been paired up before, work together to ensure the safety of all the passengers and ultimately survive the disaster.

One Chicago’s 2025 Crossover Features Kidd & Ruzek Working Together For The First Time

The Chicago Fire & Chicago PD Characters Get Stuck Underground

2025’s One Chicago crossover starts with Chicago Fire, and the hour ends with Stella Kidd and Adam Ruzek trapped underground. A train crashed into rubble after the explosion. So, Kidd and Sam Carver head down to get the passengers to safety. While Sam escapes with one injured civilian, Kidd gets stuck with the others on the train as the tunnel collapses, cutting off their exits. Before it does, though, Ruzek is chasing one of the suspects, who leads him to the underground train. As a result, Kidd and Ruzek are forced to work together for the first time in One Chicago‘s history.

Kidd and Ruzek tend to the wounded and contact their coworkers above to help everyone escape the tunnel. Unfortunately, they don’t get saved until the very end, leading to a few close calls throughout the three-hour event. However, Kidd and Ruzek prove to be a great duo, despite their little onscreen interaction before the crossover. Before the premiere of “In the Trenches,” Patrick John Flueger, who plays Ruzek, discussed finally getting to act opposite Miranda Rae Mayo, who portrays Kidd, while speaking with TV Insider. He said:

“Miranda and I have been quite close for a long time. We travel together, we’re pals outside of everything. So getting to finally actually act with her, which I’ve never done before, and if we have, it’s been with a lot of people around, so to do a little one-on-one with her was really fun. We had a good time, really supportive of each other, and I think we found things that weren’t necessarily on the page, and we had a really good team that we worked with as far as the day players and even the background folks that we were working with were incredible.”

Why Ruzek & Kidd Have Never Worked Before Despite Being In One Chicago For So Long

Miranda Rae Mayo Didn’t Join One Chicago Until 2016

Whereas Flueger’s Ruzek has been with the Chicago PD cast since season 1, Mayo’s Kidd joined Chicago Fire in the middle of season 4. Consequently, Ruzek and Kidd didn’t cross paths during the first One Chicago crossover featuring all three TV shows — “The Beating Heart” in January 2016. However, the two characters still never directly worked together in other crossovers once Kidd entered the universe.

As Flueger mentioned during his interview with TV Insider, Ruzek and Kidd might have shared scenes while in big groups in previous crossovers, such as “Infection” in 2019. The two characters never interacted with each other one-on-one until “In the Trenches,” though. The opportunity for Ruzek and Kidd to team up seemingly never presented itself. Nevertheless, after surviving the 2025 three-hour event side-by-side, Ruzek and Kidd are bonded for life in the One Chicago universe.

Ruzek & Kidd’s One Chicago Crossover Partnership Is Exciting For Their Respective Storylines

Both Characters Are A Part Of 2 Iconic One Chicago Romances

The One Chicago producers chose to stick Ruzek and Kidd together for a reason. Both belong to two of the biggest couples in the franchise — Kidd and Severide from Chicago Fire and Ruzek and Burgess from Chicago PD. By trapping Ruzek and Kidd underground, the writers created much more tension because of their strong relationships with other prominent characters, who were both anxiously awaiting their rescue while on the surface. It was also great for each couple’s storyline, as Kidd and Severide are discussing having a family, while Ruzek and Burgess are getting married soon in the One Chicago universe.