PITTSBURGH — Tristan Mikelas didn't have high expectations when his family arrived at the Dave & Buster's North Hills location along McKnight road. Upon entry to the barcade, he quietly sat and waited alongside his parents.

A few months earlier, his mother, Tonya, had stumbled upon the non-profit "So Many Angels" while casually scrolling through Facebook. She clicked and learned about an organization that went out of its way to create unique art for children battling cancer — children like her 12-year-old son.

"I didn't even care if I had to pay for it," she reflected. "I just thought it was cute."

After a little nudging, Tristan showed up to a photoshoot. He posed for a few photos, all of them snapped by the organization's founder, Matt Meiers. Each shoot has its own theme. Tristan, a die-hard Penguins fan, chose to center his theme around his favorite hockey club.

All Tristan expected to receive that evening at Dave & Buster's was the photos from that shoot. Instead, he was given an experience he will likely never forget.

Standing in front of a backdrop with numerous cameras stationed to capture his reaction, Tristan's jaw dropped to the floor after being told to look to his left. Coming around the corner was Iceburgh, the Penguins' mascot, along with goaltender Tristan Jarry.

In Jarry's hands was the final product from the photoshoot, a 16-x-24 canvas print of Tristan — glasses, mohawk Penguins gear and all — signed by Sidney Crosby, Bryan Rust and No. 35 himself.

After a few hugs and even more photos, Tristan and his family, who reside in Gibsonia, chatted with Jarry and his wife, Hannah, who helped coordinate everything with Meiers. Tristan, grinning ear-to-ear, shot the breeze with his favorite NHL netminder, all while Tonya and her husband, Mike, both continuously thanked the Jarrys for their time.

"This is actually my third year working with 'So Many Angels,' " Hannah explained. " ... They've always just done such an incredible job."

"It's special," her husband and the Penguins' goalie added. "Being able to do this, taking an hour or so out of your day, makes it worthwhile to be able to see the faces of the parents and the kids. We're able to do this, and it brings us a lot of joy."

After nearly an hour, the Jarrys — who were asked to stick around for 10 minutes — made their exit. The Mikelas family, meanwhile, hung back a bit longer, still reeling from everything that had unfolded.

"I was in shock," young Tristian said later on. "Mind blown."

It's the exact reaction "So Many Angels" aims for each time it takes on a new project.

Tristan's story

Tristan's cancer diagnosis came in June 2024. He had been getting frequent headaches, but with proper rest they'd go away. His parents thought it was just childhood migraines, nothing too major.

But everything changed one Sunday afternoon.

The Mikelas family was at church. Tristan, then 10 years old, asked to go to the restroom. While making the walk, Mike noticed his son walk into a wall. Tonya, meanwhile, recognized a droop on the right side of his face, especially when he attempted to smile.

"He was a little off but seemed OK," Mike recalled.

Thankfully, they played things safe and took their only child to Wexford Health and Wellness Pavilion. There, doctors insisted Tristan undergo a CT scan. His parents began to worry that he had a stroke. The reality was even more terrifying.

Mike and Tonya Mikelas learned that the doctors noticed a giant mass inside Tristan's skull.

"At that point, the floor just falls out from under you," Mike said. "We didn't know what to think. We didn't know what to do."

Doctors immediately referred Tristan to a children's hospital. Mike and Tonya assumed he'd be rushed there via ambulance. Instead, he was life-flighted. Tonya still becomes overwhelmed with emotion when thinking back to that flight, with thoughts of her son's potential funeral swirling around her mind. Mike, meanwhile, made a lonely drive to meet the two, pondering similar things.

Upon arrival, Tristan was diagnosed with brain cancer. Dr. Taylor Abel, the neurologist working that afternoon, delivered the news. Fifteen minutes later, he took action.

"I just got here right now," Abel told Mike and Tonya. "I'm fresh. I'm taking him right now, and I'm going to save your son."

Dr. Abel held true to his word. Mike and Tonya were beside themselves the entire night, waiting in horror as the hospital's priest, father Nick Argentieri, sat alongside them. Eventually they learned the good news: Tristan was going to be OK. But he wasn't exactly out of the woods.

While doctors were able to remove a significant portion of the tumor, some of it was wrapped around the carotid artery in his brain. Additional removal attempts were too risky, as one mistake could end his life.

"He said there were treatment plans, there were things we could do and that it wasn't the end of the world," Mike said. "But to see your kid looking like that, laying in a bed with tubes and everything else, it was horrible."

The Mikelas family made the decision to move their son to in-patient care. There, they learned more about his condition. The tumor was the product of a BRAF mutation, which triggers cells to always want to grow. This would eventually be combated by radiation treatments. But first, Tristan had to get back on his feet — literally.

Just 48 hours after his surgery, Tristan was walking. Mike and Tonya were told the average in-patient care stay for someone following his operation was around two weeks. He was discharged in six days.

Not long after his discharge, radiation treatment began. Tristan went through 33 sessions, all while continuing to attend school. Only toward the end did he begin to show signs of fatigue. Next was a clinical drug trial. He has been placed on two medications that target the genetic mutation and keep the tumor from growing.

Seventeen months have gone by since Tristan's horrifying Sunday afternoon. He's still in the midst of his cancer battle, but he is more than holding his own. Tristan's parents say doctors deemed him "as close to a poster child for success as possible."

He's back to playing dek hockey, video games and bringing home report cards that make his parents proud.

"I get to live my normal life again," Tristan said with a smile.

Stumbling upon Angels

Tonya Mikelas doesn't attempt to hide her love of documenting her son's life. She proudly boasts her photo albums that cover every one of Tristan's journeys.

Altogether, she has more than 77,000 saved photos of her baby boy. Had it not been for stumbling on the "So Many Angels" Facebook page, she'd still be without her new favorite one.

Created in 2017 by Meiers, a 59-year-old Harmony resident, "So Many Angels" aims to provide empowering photo experiences to children with cancer and life-altering diagnoses, transforming them into superheroes, princesses, athletes, and more.

Meiers developed the idea of his organization a year before it came to be. One day, while scrolling through social media, he came across a photo a friend posted of his young son, dressed in a Batman costume, overlooking the city where they lived.

At that time, Meiers was a professional photographer. The bulk of his work centered around shooting fitness models.

"My job was to capture people displaying their best self," Meiers said. "I thought, 'Why not show these kids the best version of themselves,' like I was doing with my clients at that time?"

But having the skill set was only half of it. Meiers had also been searching for a more meaningful way to use his talents. In 2016, the same year he noticed the childhood Batman photo, he met someone who, as a child, received a Make-A-Wish effort.

The woman, who grew up in Florida, said her wish was to go skiing. Make-A-Wish made it happen, coordinating a ski trip for her entire family.

"She said something that stuck with me," Meiers said. "She said, 'For that week, I was not sick.' "

That feeling, Meiers says, is something he aims to provide to as many sick children — along with their families — as possible.

Tristan was one of seven children to receive a custom portrait that evening. Others included real-life adaptations of a young girl dressed as Cinderella and a young boy in the midst of the "Minecraft" universe.

Over the past eight years, "So Many Angels" has given 325 children a reason to smile. Each child receives a 16-x-24 inch custom portrait catered to their own personal interest, along with a blanket that features the organization's branding. These gifts — which cost about $350 per child — are funded via donations. The families who receive them don't pay a single penny.

The organization's efforts are most prominent in Pittsburgh but have also been featured in other areas. Anytime Meiers is on the road, especially when traveling to photography conferences, he tries his best to help families in that city.

Even when away from home, each project gets Meiers' 100% effort.

"It has to be the same experience or similar," Meiers said. "It's like a Big Mac — the sauce tastes the same in Seattle, in Dallas, in Houston, in Kansas City as it does here in Pittsburgh."

A desire to give more

Long after the Mikelases along with the six other families left the event, Meiers remained at Dave & Buster's, cleaning up everything by himself. More work awaits him at home in the form of uploading all the photos from that evening to his organization's website.

But despite the looming commitment, after packing his gatherings, Meiers took a seat to admire what had just taken place. The sweat on his brow, the constant hustle, all of that and more was worth it.

"From the first reveal to the last one, what I'll remember is each family's reaction, the words that they said to me, the thanks, the gratefulness, the smiles," Meiers said. "Each of these families are going through crap. If we can just — and this is the word that families have used with me before — if we can be a good distraction for 15 minutes, then that's enough for me."

As a new year approaches, Meiers aims to take his operation to another level. For years, he's struggled with the idea of putting any sort of spotlight on himself. But recently, he decided it was necessary to help the organization grow.

Meiers hopes to one day help over 300 kids in a single year. In order for that to happen, he understands more people must get on board. The Penguins have been supportive of his efforts, thus the connection between him and the Jarry family. He hopes to build similar relationships with the Steelers and Pirates.

Meiers also hopes to build a stronger connection to local hospitals, as they can provide him direct access to more families he can assist. He's also welcoming donations, which can be made on his website.

"It took me 50 years for me to figure out why God put me here on earth," Meiers said. "I found it. I feel so blessed and lucky and grateful because there are so many people who will never figure it out. I just wish I could bottle that.

"If one person sees what we do and does something nice or great for somebody, that's worth it. It's worth it already for me. These families go through so much already. We ask nothing from them. They ask nothing from us, but they're so grateful for what we do."

The children who receive these gifts will go home and still continue to battle their respective health conditions. Their families will continue along that journey, hoping and praying for a better tomorrow. Something as simple as a photo and a blanket might not seem like much. But to the recipients, it means far more than those unfamiliar with their situation could ever understand.

"That we can press forward," Tonya said when asked to explain what her son's gift meant to their family. "That there's hope and that there are people out there who really care about him, aside from us.

"It's stuff like this that will keep him motivated to press on and never give up."

© 2025 the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Visit www.post-gazette.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.