Braeden Rios, 7, sees the Iowa Ghostbusters' ECTO-1 arriving at his home in Clinton, Iowa for his birthday party on Tuesday. Braeden's twin sister Abigail, 7, was also quite surprised to the paranormal investigators and eliminator pulling into their driveway.
Braeden's mother Michelle said she approached the cosplay group on Facebook while trying to find a gift for her son on the Web. She told them about her son's obsession with the Ghostbusters and his struggles with bronchial malacia, a lung disease that can cause breathing problems and respiratory tract infections. Andrew Smith, a co-founding member of the Ghostbusters group, said he and his co-founder Matt Bousman offered to make a personal visit for Braeden's birthday party.
Braeden shows off the Certificate of Recruitment awarded to him by Bousman, left and Smith, right, making him an official member of the Iowa Ghostbusters.
The Iowa Ghostbusters also gave Braeden two vials of ectoplasm including the green kind usually found on Class 4 full roaming vapors and the pink kind that makes toasters dance to Jackie Wilson songs.
Smith and Bousman let their new recruit actually fire a beam of protons and hope that he doesn't cross the streams causing all life as you know it stopping instantaneously and every molecule in your body exploding at the speed of light.
