AP Photo/Tony Gutierrez, File

Yesterday, a deranged man decided to commit a mass shooting. He picked out a target and approached, armed and holding plenty of ammo. He opened fire and stood ready to carry out what would only be described as an atrocity.

He’d even picked out a gun free zone.

Too bad for him, there were still good guys with guns on hand.

A man in a mask and combat gear was fatally shot Monday morning in downtown Dallas after he opened fire with an assault weapon outside the Earle Cabell Federal Building. No one else was injured.

FBI Special Agent in Charge Matthew DeSarno identified the gunman as [redacted] 22, at a news conference on a street corner near the federal building. [Redacted] died at the scene and was taken to Baylor University Medical Center, officials said.

Neither DeSarno nor Erin Nealy Cox, U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Texas, gave any indication why [he] targeted the federal building. They also did not say who shot [him] after police responded to an active-shooter call.

Federal authorities leading the investigation have not offered a motive for his attack, which ended when he was fatally wounded during an exchange of gunfire.

What we do know is that the shooter was an Army veteran who did two years in service, then got out. Based on a meme, the Dallas News seems to suggest that he was an incel, or “involuntary celibate” and may have been lashing out over that. If that’s true, he wouldn’t be the first incel to commit such an attack. That dubious honor goes to the perpetrator of the Toronto van attack that killed 10 people.

However, there are a few takeaways from this incident that bear mentioning.

First, the shooter was armed with an AR-15, but the only fatality was himself. Contrast that with the Toronto attack for a moment. In that incident, 10 people were killed with a motor vehicle.

Do you still want to tell me that AR-15s are too deadly?

Second, while the target was technically a gun free zone, what the shooter in question failed to account for is that there’s still going to be armed security. That armed security responded quickly and prevented a bad situation from becoming a bloodbath.

While we don’t know who put the shooter down, we do know someone did. This despite him being armed with a “murder-death-kill” weapon that has been held up in the press as so lethal.

Undoubtedly, someone will try to claim that armed security, much less police, don’t count as a “good guy with a gun,” but that’s false. They very much count. They’re armed individuals who serve the side of law and protect human life.

The difference is that they’re allowed to be good guys with guns in places where you and I are forcibly disarmed. In this case, folks got lucky. They really did. They had armed protection. That’s something that didn’t exist in Virginia Beach and was completely ineffective in Parkland. Here, it worked, and it saved their lives.

Gun free zones, however, limit the potential response. In this case, there was sufficient armed response to protect human life, but what about the other places mandated by law to be gun free zones that lack that degree of protection? People die. Plain and simple.

In this case, folks got lucky because the people who did have guns were good guys who were ready to respond. That’s not true in every case. Again, see Parkland.

So much for “The good guy with a gun is a myth” thing, huh?