Eneas's forces were pursuing the Saitan fighters. In fact, if the enemy had turned their ships against them, the eleven mechs and seven fighters could not have done much, however, those fast ships seemed to have intentions other than a raid.
Just as humans did, the best way to communicate over great distances in space was to send mail ships with orders.
The falcons and Eneas' Phoenix were much faster than the Saitan fighters, they would soon enter the close firing zone.
Enemy forces had been detected in the Centauros 12 system, a tangled system of twelve planets orbiting a binary system of two stars. This caused the orbits and trajectories of the planets to deviate from the typical ellipse, allowing for good coverage.