my @c = combine(5,@n); # get array of arrays
my @A = @$c[0];        # get first sub-array

##</code><code>##

>perl -wMstrict -MData::Dump -le
"my @c = (['x', 'y'], ['a', 'b'], ['c', 'd']);
 my $c = ['foo', 'bar'];
 ;;
 my @A1 = @  $c[0]  ;
 my @A2 = @{ $c[0] };
 dd \@A1;
 dd \@A2;
"
["foo"]

["x", "y"]