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He knew it was a dream right away.
He told everyone that. And it was true. What was untrue was the reason why.
He realized it was a dream thanks to Bruce. Not in the way most think. Yes, he did eventually, along with the Flash, find the way to free them. But.
And that's it. The fact that The Flash and Bruce had saved them and that he knew it was a dream from the start should be the only things that matter.
Not what happened.
Not why he knew it was dream.
NOT WHAT HAPPENED.
But they had to say or show. And he wouldn't say so he had to show.
They went into his mind and saw part of what was in the farthest corners of his heart and that hurt. It wasn't fair. It wasn't right. No one was supposed to know but him.
But he's just a little kid and they're adults. They know what's best and they're his parents/family/bosses and they needed to know.
And it hurt. He couldn't stand for them all, especially Bruce to see his mind - his heart, so he forced them out, forced out the words, the lies that were the only things he could tell without breaking his own heart.
He told them that he knew it was a dream because his parents were alive and well and had aged.
And everyone knew it was a lie, but they knew that they could only push him so far. Especially with the sanity of his other teammates on the line.
He was the first awake, but he was still so weak from lack of nourishment that he had to stay in the medical bay with the rest. Even now he can see Wally smiling brokenly at his uncle. M'Gann placid face, a mirror image of her uncle's. Superboy sitting quietly with Superman by his side, speaking to him softly.
Kaldur and Artemis weren't awake yet. He didn't know who looked worse out of Aquaman or Green Arrow, but he was too tired to even try and make comparisons.
Usually the Bruce in his head would tell him that exhaustion was no excuse for being unobservant.
But. And there it is. That word again. But.
But, the Bruce that usually lived in his head, the one that was a copy of the one he lived with, the one that was Batman, had been overshadowed. By the Bruce who lived in the lock box in his heart.
That Bruce was the reason he knew it was a dream.
The fact that his parents were there in that world wasn't unusual.
Too many late night patrols, vomiting in reaction to gore or simply not eating as a precaution for the gore had led to many waking hallucinations.
He saw his parents often, and after he'd figured out how to use the face recognition software, he even knew what they'd have looked like had they lived.
And that statement is key. Had. They. Lived.
He was well aware that they were dead. That's why he didn't talk to them. They just were. Nothing he could do to change that.
In the dream. In that place. They interacted as if they thought they were real. And the environment reacted thus. Again, nothing new. He'd hallucinated them having tea with he, Alfred and a purple baboon before. Nothing out of the ordinary.
In fact, everything was simply and amazingly life like. Everything except the one thing he expected to stay the same.
There's a reason he didn't want them in his head - not even Bruce.
It wasn't because he'd left them out or it was violent. They were there. They had the same places in his life as in the real world. They were normal.
The reason he kicked them out was because he couldn't stand to explain to his boss, his father, his hero that in his heart of hearts that he wishes he were different.
How could he say, "The reason I knew it was a dream was because Bruce was smiling."
How do you tell someone that the reason you could differentiate between reality and an almost perfect facsimile of it was because in that world they loved you and in reality you aren't sure?
The thing is. You don't.
Because it's not worth the pain, on either side, of knowing you were wrong.
Or right.