Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.

<passage>:
sag of the dust I learned to spot a passable crack, and tell it from an impassable cut. Time after time the Bugs ground to had no stomach for mysteries, vast or trifling, and there driving wisecracks, witticisms, unfunny jokes that wore thin with repetition. He took to making side trips from the route now and then, never far, but a little further each time. Jack Stone reacted quite the opposite he grew quieter with number. Across to the right was a group that Baron knew the patrons were few in Presently a small, grizzled man crossed the room and sat down at Baron’s table. He was short and wiry. His face held no key to his age—he might have been thirty or a thousand—but constantly and the skin on our faces itched and tingled at the end of an eight-hour trek. But it took one of those side trips of McIvers’ to deliver the route and was almost out of sight in a cloud of ash when we heard a sharp cry through our earphones. “At perihelion?” “Of course. When else?” without expression. Then he said slowly, “No, I’m afraid you’re I wheeled my Bug around with my heart in my throat and Peter Claney?” “That’s right.” of a Bug middle, half-buried in a rock slide. A dozen feet away were where have you been hiding? We’ve been trying to contact you for months!” two insulated suits with white bones gleaming through the an old-fashioned half-track model of the sort that hadn’t been in use for years. It was wedged tight in a cut in “I know. I was hoping you’d quit looking and chuck the whole idea.” felt different. “But you’ve got to. You’re the only man on Earth who’s attempted a Brightside Crossing and lived through it! And the have to know.” “It’s simple. We failed because it can’t be done. We couldn’t One error in judgment could sink us all, but I wasn’t thinking me worried. I kept thinking, better McIvers should go than me. It was the planet thought out of my mind. Sun . They’ll whip you, too, if you try it.” that whipped us, that and the a sharp cut ahead where the surface dropped six feet beyond a deep crack. I let out a shout to halt the others then I edged my Bug I think. I followed the news stories like a tri-V serial and then I was heartbroken when they just disappeared. I know now that they were a pair of idiots, starting off without rising from the cracks, so I was almost on top of it when I saw proper equipment, with practically no knowledge of surface Twilight Lab up there and began to get Brightside into my blood, sure as death. But it was Mikuta’s idea to attempt a Crossing. Did you ever know Tom Mikuta? I don’t suppose you did. No, not Japanese—Polish-American. He was a major in the Interplanetary Service for some years and hung onto the title after he gave up his commission. I’d always liked the Major—he was big and quiet and cool, the sort of guy who always had things figured a little further with no judgment. The Major had both. He also had the kind of personality that could take a crew of wild men and make them work like a well-oiled machine across a thousand miles of Venus jungle. I liked him and I trusted him. He contacted me in New York and he was very casual at “That much!” he said. “Well, there can’t be much fat on “No, I mean real heat.” He threw his head back. “Why try a Crossing at aphelion? What have you done then? Four thousand miles of butcherous heat, just to have some joker come along, use your data and drum you out of the glory by crossing at perihelion forty-four That makes the Brightside of Mercury at perihelion the hottest place in the Solar System, with one single exception: the just how hellish and they never came back to tell about it. It obvious jumping-off place. The setup there wasn’t very extensive—a rocket landing, the labs and quarters for Sanderson’s crew sunk deep into the crust, and the tower that housed Poor Jack met us at the rocket landing almost bawling, Sanderson Stone was a youngster—hardly twenty-five, I’d say—but he’d been with the Major at Vulcan and had begged to join this trek. I had a funny feeling that Jack really didn’t care for exploring too much, but he thought Mikuta was God, followed him around like a puppy. It didn’t matter to me as long as he knew what he was getting ever give you an answer that makes sense. Anyway, Stone had We dug right in. With plenty of funds—tri-V money and some government cash the Major had talked his way around—our equipment was new and good. Mikuta had done the designing and testing himself, with a big assist from Sanderson. We had four Bugs, three of them the light pillow-tire models, The Major went over them like a kid at the circus. Then he said, “Have you heard anything from McIvers?” “Who’s he?” Stone wanted to know. I’d heard plenty of stories about Ted McIvers and I wasn’t too happy to hear that he was joining us. “Kind of a daredevil, isn’t he?” gone. “Great balls of fire, man— “Maybe. He’s lucky and skillful. Where do you draw the McIvers. We understood each other when I talked up the trip to him and we’re going to need each other too much to they were. The best available were pretty poor, taken from so the board, “is largely inactive, according to Sanderson. But vapor, as well as carbon disulfide and sulfur dioxide. The atmospheric tide moved toward the Darkside, where it condensed, carrying enough volcanic ash with it for Sanderson he couldn’t see why everyone should get so excited. He was a tall, rangy man with long, wavy hair prematurely sleepy, almost indolent, but capable of abrupt alertness. Stone and McIvers were thick as thieves, and everything was set for an early departure after we got some rest. like this, and some of the best wouldn’t seem to be the most route next.” was only half done—we would still have to travel another two thousand miles to the opposite twilight zone. Sanderson McIvers and Stone exchanged glances. McIvers said: “Jack “It sounds like I am,” I cut in. “We want to keep the lead Bug light as possible.” Mikuta nodded. “That’s right. Peter’s Bug is stripped down to the frame and wheels.” McIvers shook his head. “No, I mean the advance work. I can stay on good solid ground, of course, but scan the area closely and radio back to Peter where to avoid the flaws. Then—” “But why not? We could save ourselves days!” McIvers stared at him, his cheeks an angry red. Finally he gave a sullen nod. “Okay. If you say so.” We’re going to hit Center together, and finish the Crossing together. Got that?” McIvers nodded. Mikuta then looked at Stone and me and we nodded, too. “All right,” he said slowly. “Now that we’ve got it straight, the Twilight Lab. I moved out first bite. We didn’t feel degrees, for whatever help that was. And then we ate from the forward sledge—sucking through tubes—protein, carbohydrates, at each other. Then McIvers would say how good a beer would taste, and off we’d go. We’d have murdered our grandmothers the challenge was so powerful you could almost feel it. No one the hardest way possible: overland, through anything the land itself. cones. Yellow fumes rose from the craters constantly their sides were shrouded with heavy ash. dust—silicates and salts, pumice and limestone and granite ash, filling crevices and declivities—offering a soft, treacherous surface for the Bug’s pillow tires. I learned to read the ground, to tell a covered fault by the

<question>:
Who seems to be the least intelligent person?

<options>:
A Stone
B McIvers
C Sanderson
D Mikuta

<answer>:

B