Tess faces a terrible choice between the eternal purity of a phoenix's existence, and the darkness that is the unlife of a vampire.

She tries to ask Kevin what has happened to him since they last spoke, but her mind is overwhelmed by the purity and beauty of the phoenix's nature, and she instantly loses interest in asking questions.

Algernon breaks out of his cage and escapes into the sewers, and as a rat Tess follows him to an empty house filled with thousands of his kind.

When she does return, he takes her for a walk through the streets, and then demonstrates the truly awesome and horrible skill which he has learned by Switching into a vampire.

Once she is in this form, all of Tess' revulsion toward the concept of vampirism vanishes, but Martin warns her not to kill her victim when she feeds, as doing so would arouse suspicion.

At last when her mother mentions the phoenix, the memory of her time as one of those glorious, pure bird dispels the lingering aspects of the vampire personality, and she apologises for her behaviour.

He tells her that his fifteenth birthday is the following day, and, because he intends to remain a vampire, he offers her the chance to join him willingly.

Martin, his defences lowered, breaks down over the loss of his father, but when Tess tries to comfort him, he realises he is vulnerable and runs off into the trees.

Their discussion is interrupted by the arrival of Algernon, who informs them that Martin has disappeared, and that his control over the rats of the city is broken.

The principal theme of Midnight's Choice (as with all the books of the Switchers Trilogy) is the idea of 'coming of age', and the possibilities which teenagers face in the world as they grow up.

The two supernatural creatures which appear as rivals in Midnight's Choice are drawn from two widely known, folkloric myths: That of the phoenix and that of the vampire.

The vampire offers an eternal life of dark power and security from grief within the cold persona of the hunter, but which bars its subject from love or closeness.