Perl is interpreting 1.2.3 as a vstring (version string), so it's trying to print chr(1) . chr(2) . chr(3) ... which is printing ^A^B^C, which doesn't print nicely :-)

s**lil*;  $*=join'',sort split q**;  s;.*;grr; &&s+(.(.)).+$2$1+; $; =
qq-$_-;s,.*,ahc,;$,.=chop for split q,,,reverse;print for($,,$;,$*,$/)
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