This is a Cold War science fiction story. A worker at a nuclear munitions plant is sure that a nuclear war will occur within forty-eight hours. He plots with a friend of his who is a test pilot to steal an experimental space craft (actually it looked like the flying saucer from Forbidden Planet) and escape to another planet with their families. The base has some kind of security chief who suspects the plot and he shows up that night to transparently hint that he suspects they will attempt to steal the space craft. When they try to sneak on the base the security guy catches them and threatens them with a pistol. They turn the tables on him and after repelling the security forces they succeed in escaping into outer space.
On the ship (which also looks like the internal set from the Forbidden Planet space craft) we find out that their destination is the third planet from the sun which the inhabitants call “Earth.”
So, this is a pretty straight up sci fi from the period with the whole Cold War nuclear war phobia thing. The protagonist lays on the anti-military thing a little thick for my taste. I looked up the actor and found out he had been a conscientious objector in WWII. But Serling always seemed like a Lefty so it goes with the territory. It’s a simple story and even though the surprise twist is kind of lame I actually enjoy watching the episode. It’s sort of a fairy tale. I’ll give it a B+.