The answer is the second option, which is: Marcus is correct. If any integer is raised to any integer exponent, the base is multiplied times the exponent. The product of two integers is always a rational number.
The explanation for this answer is shown below:
By definition, the set of integers contains the positive numbers, negative numbers and the zero. The rational numbers are those numbers that can be written as a fraction.
The number
is an integer, but also can be written as
. Then, it is a rational number too.
If it is raised to the integer exponent
, it means that you must multiplied the number
twice. The result will be an integer, which you can write it in the form of a fraction with
as its denominator:
